THE INSTITUTE OF NAUTICAL ARCHAEOLOGY

FOUNDERS
George F. Bass, Ph.D., Chairman Emeritus†
Michael Katzev (deceased)
Jack W. Kelley†

Officers/Administration
James P. Delgado, Ph.D., President*
Claudia F. LeDoux, Vice-President, Administration
Cemal M. Pulak, Ph.D., Vice President
Kevin J. Crisman, Ph.D., Vice President
Michelle D. Chmelar, Accounting Officer
Tuba Ekmekçi, Director, Bodrum Research Center
Özlem Doğan, Finance Manager, Bodrum Research Center

Board of Directors & Officers

William L. Allen Robert Hohlfelder, Ph.D.

Oğuz Aydemir Charles Johnson, Ph.D.*
Robert D. Ballard, Ph.D. Gregory M. Kiez
Edward O. Boshell, Jr. Capt. Alfred S. McLaren, USN (Ret.), Ph.D.
John Cassils, M.D. Elsa A. Murano, Ph.D
Gregory M. Cook Alex G. Nason
William C. Culp, M.D. George E. Robb, Jr.
Lucy Darden* Andrew Sansom, Ph.D.*
Thomas F. Darden Clyde P. Smith, Treasurer*
John De Lapa Jason Sturgis
C. Curtis Dunnavan Peter van Alfen, Ph.D.
Claude Duthuit Frederick van Doorninck, Jr., Ph.D.*
Danielle J. Feeney* Robert L. Walker, Ph.D.*
Charles P. Garrison, M.D., Vice Chairman* Peter M. Way, Past Chairman*
Donald Geddes III, Chairman* Robyn Woodward, Ph.D.
James Goold, Secretary & General Counsel* Sally M. Yamini

Gordon W. Bass
George R. Belcher
Raynette Boshell
Allan Campbell, M.D.
Glenn Darden
Nicholas Griffis
Jeff Hakko
Robin P. Hartmann
Faith Hentschel, Ph.D.
Associate Directors
Susan Katzev Anne Darden Self
William C. Klein, M.D. Lynn Baird Shaw
Selçuk Kolay Betsey Boshell Todd
George Lodge Mary Tooze
Anthony Marshall Lew Ward
Thomas McCasland, Jr. Garry A. Weber
Dana F. McGinnis Roger A. Williamson, Ph.D.
Michael Plank
Margaret Jane Zemla Sağlam
Executive Committee * Non-voting Board †

www.inadiscover.com 
 THE INSTITUTE OF NAUTICAL ARCHAEOLOGY AT
TEXAS A&M UNIVERSITY
Nautical Archaeology Program Faculty

Deborah N. Carlson, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor, Sara W. and George O. Yamini Fellow
Luis Filipe Vieira de Castro, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor, Frederick R. Mayer Faculty Fellow of Nautical Archaeology
Kevin J. Crisman, Ph.D.†
Associate Professor, Nautical Archaeology Faculty Fellow
Donny L. Hamilton, Ph.D.
George T. & Gladys H. Abell Chair in Nautical Archaeology, Yamini Family Chair in Liberal Arts
Cemal Pulak, Ph.D.
Frederick R. Mayer Faculty Professor of Nautical Archaeology
C. Wayne Smith, Ph.D.
Associate Professor, INA Faculty Fellow
Shelley Wachsmann, Ph.D.
Meadows Professor of Biblical Archaeology

Nautical Archaeology Program Emeritus Faculty

George F. Bass, Ph.D.

George T. & Gladys H. Abell Chair in Nautical Archaeology
Yamini Family Chair in Liberal Arts, Distinguished Professor, Emeritus
Frederick H. van Doorninck, Jr., Ph.D.
Frederick R. Mayer Faculty Professor of Nautical Archaeology, Emeritus

Research Associates
J. Barto Arnold, M.A. Jerome L. Hall, Ph.D. Robin C.M. Piercy
Dante Bartoli Frederick Hanselmann, M.A. Juan Pinedo
Kroum Batchvarov Kenzo Hayashida John Pollack
Piotr Bojakowski Faith D. Hentschel, Ph.D. Mark Polzer
Carlos Cabrera Nicolle Hirschfeld, Ph.D. Donald Rosencrantz
Lilia Campana Frederick Hocker, Ph.D. Jeff Royal, Ph.D.
Alexis Catsambis Jun Kimura Randall Sasaki
Arthur Cohn, J.D. Carolyn G. Koehler, Ph.D. George Schwarz
Katie Custer, M.A. Justin Leidwanger Tufan Turanlı
Ben Ford Margaret E. Leshikar-Denton, Ph.D. Peter van Alfen, Ph.D.
Donald A. Frey, Ph.D. Mariá del Pilar Luna Erreguerena Cheryl Ward, Ph.D.
Jeremy Green, M.A. Asaf Oron Gordon P. Watts, Jr., Ph.D.
Elizabeth Greene, Ph.D. Ralph K. Pedersen, Ph.D. Robyn Woodward, Ph.D

ii The INA Annual 2007

The Institute of Nautical Archaeology acknowledges and thanks the gener-
ous donors, sponsors, friends, and partners who made its work in 2007 possible:

Anonymous • Carole Alexander • Robert D. Ballard • George F. Bass • Gordon Bass • Maria Pia
Bassani • David Batchelor • Bruce Baughman • George R. Belcher • J. Billipp • Duncan Boeckman
• Alan Boeghold • Raynette and Edward Boshell • Elizabeth Bruni • Virginia Burgess • Marlene
Burns • John Calhoun • Allan Campbell • Bill Caruth • Ken Cassavoy • John Cassils • H. Caulkins
• James Chaney • Peter Clark • Charles Collins • Stuart Collins • Communities Foundation of
Tampa Bay • Communities Foundation of Texas • Charles Consolvo • Gregory Cook • R.C. Cross
• William Culp • Cultural Encounters • William Dales • Dallas Museum of Art • Lucy Darden
• Thomas Darden • Edward Daughney • John De Lapa • James P. Delgado • Everett Deschner
• Daniel Donahue • Franklin Drake • Bob Drolesky • Curt Dunnavan • Claude Duthuit • Ann
Duwe • Jean Eckert • Ed Rachal Foundation • Cynthia Eiseman • Norman Estabrook • Danielle
Feeney • Diane Feeney • Mike Fitzgerald • O. Frazier • French American Charitable Trust (FACT)
• Galveston Historical Foundation • Charles Garrison • G. Donald Geddes III • Roger Gesswein •
Sherman Gray • Susan Grayson • Jeremy Green • Daniel Greenspun • Nicholas Griffis • David
Hadley • Jeff Hakko • Michael Halpern • Steve Harris • Robin Hartmann • George Haskew •
Edmund Hayes • Faith Hentschel • Herzstein Charitable Foundation • Jeff Hines • Peter Hobart •
Robert Hohlfelder • Rick Holton • Institute for Aegean Prehistory • Frederick Jessop • David Jones
• Joukowsky Family Foundation • Roberto Junco • George Kabureck • Joan Kahn • Virginia Kanick
• Susan Katzev • Philip Key • Greg Kiez • Lowell King • William Klein • David H. Koch •
Carolyn Koehler • Selcuk Kolay • Weldon Kruger • Peter Kuniholm • Ben Lambiotte • Francine
LeFrak-Friedberg • Hugh Lehman • Margaret Leshikar-Denton • Daryl Libow • Edward Lipp •
George Lodge • Cynthia Lord • Lubrizol Foundation • Luso American Foundation • Edward Lynch
• William Lyons • Bill Mathers • Roy Matthews • Anna Marguerite McCann • Tom McCasland
• Larry McCurdy • MacDonald Center for Ancient History • Dana McGinnis • Brian McLaggan •
Maritime Heritage Society • John Merwin • Isaac Morris • Alex G. Nason • National Geographic
Society • National Taiwan University • Madeline Nelson • George Newton • Oklahoma Historical
Society • Orbital Sciences Corporation • Harold Patton • Martin Perryman • Michael Plank • Ga-
brella Pratt • Richmond Prehn • Frank Putnam • RPM Nautical Foundation • George Robb • Dan
Robertson • Mr. and Mrs. R. Rosenberg • Paula Ruth • Marian Sagan • Samuel H. Kress Foundation
• San Antonio Area Foundation • Allan Saunders • Nelson Schaenen • Ladd Seaberg • Lynn Shaw
• Austin Smith • Clyde P. Smith • Helen Spalding • Spiegel Television • Joanne Starr • Scott
Steele • J. Richard Steffy • Strake Foundation • Mike Stude • Jason Sturgis • Judy and William
Sturgis • Wilma Sulka • Summerlee Foundation • Texas A&M University • Timken-Sturgis Foun-
dation • Mary Tooze • J. Twardowski • Aleydis van de Moortel • Frederick van Doorninck, Jr. •
Richard Vedder • C. Elizabeth Wagner Charitable Fund • The Waitt Institute for Discovery • Cheryl
Ward • Lew Ward • Peter Way • Laura Wertheimer • Barbara Westall • David Whitt • Eliza-
beth Will • Jordan Willard • Roger Williamson • Mollie Williford • Williford Energy Company •
Robyn Woodward • Yapi Kredi Emeklilik A.S. • Zegrahm Exeditions, Inc. • Margaret Zemla-Sağlam

www.inadiscover.com iii
 Please address all submission and reprint requests to the Editor, INA Annual, P.O. Drawer HG, College
Station, Texas, 77841, USA or to editor@inadiscover.com.

If you are interested in becoming a member of INA, please visit our website at www.inadiscover.com or
contact our offices at +979.845.6694, fax +979.847.9260

The Institute of Nautical Archaeology is a non-profit corporation whose mission is to continue the search
for the history of civilization by fostering excellence in underwater archaeology. The opinions expressed
in The INA Annual articles are those of the authors, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Insti-
tute. ©November 2008 by the Institute of Nautical Archaeology. All rights reserved. ISSN 1090-2635

KRISTIN ROMEY, EDITOR

iv The INA Annual 2007

 THE INA ANNUAL 2007

6 FROM THE PRESIDENT
James P. DELGADO

7 2007 TURKISH COAST SURVEY

George F. BASS

10 THE WESTERN LEDGE REEF WRECK

Research on the Reconstruction of the 16th-centuty Iberian Wreck from Bermuda
Piotr BOJAKOWSKI

16 FINDS FROM HISPALIS

A Byzantine Anchor and Medieval Small Boat From the Ancient Harbor of Seville
Carlos CABRERA TEJEDOR

22 LEAVING NO STONE UNTURNED

The 2007 Excavation Season at Kızılburun, Turkey
Deborah N. Carlson and Carrie E. Atkins

29 LAKE ONTARIO MARITIME CULTURAL LANDSCAPE PROJECT, 2007 SEASON

Gunboats, Shipyards, and Haydocks
Ben FORD

35 THE FRIGATE ERTUĞRUL

The 2007 Underwater Survey off Oshima Island, Japan
Berta LLedÓ and Cemal PULAK
contributions by Kazuhiro Hantani and Selçuk Kolay

42 SEEKING EARLY BRONZE-AGE TRADE MARINERS

Underwater at Tell Fadous-Kfarabida, Lebanon
Ralph K. PEDERSEN

48 YUKON RIVER SURVEY 2007

John Pollack and Robin WOODWARD

57 PHOENICIANS IN THE WEST

The Ancient Shipwreck Site of Bajo de la Campana, Spain
Mark E. Polzer and Juan Pinedo reyes

www.inadiscover.com 
 A NEW BEGINNING
James P. DELGADO
President, Institute of Nautical Archaeology

Welcome to the first issue of the new INA Annual. This inaugural issue examines projects and research con-
ducted by INA Research Associates and the Nautical Archaeology Program faculty at Texas A&M Univer-
sity in the previous calendar year of 2007. Subsequent issues will cover work conducted in 2008 and beyond.

In 2007, thanks to the generous support of INA directors, friends, and other supporters, including founda-
tions and other grantors, and partnerships including INA’s major support from Texas A&M University, as well
as partnering societies, institutions and museums, seventeen archaeological projects took place in the United
States, Canada, Bermuda, Cyprus, Turkey, Lebanon, Israel, Spain, Portugal and Japan. These projects ranged
from field surveys, site assessments, excavations, and post-excavation analysis and conservation in the INA Bo-
drum Research Center in Bodrum, Turkey, in partnership with the Bodrum Museum of Underwater Archaeology.

Each year the Institute of Nautical Archaeology conducts one or more excavations on important shipwrecks that have the
potential to answer key research questions. In 2007, Dr. Deborah Carlson of the Nautical Archaeology Program of the
Department of Anthropology at Texas A&M University conducted the third excavation season on the first-century B.C.
Roman period shipwreck at Kızılburun with its cargo of worked marble, including a monumental column’s drums. Dr.
Cemal Pulak of the Nautical Archaeology Program at Texas A&M University, and an INA Vice President, worked on his
fifth and sixth shipwrecks at Yenikapi, the now landfilled Byzantine harbor of Constantinople and a veritable graveyard of
more than 33 shipwrecks discovered during construction in amazingly good condition in present day Istanbul. Dr. Kevin
Crisman of the Nautical Archaeology Program recovered nearly all of the remaining mechanical elements from Heroine,
an 1838 steamboat sunk in the Red River in Oklahoma. A test excavation of Cartagena, Spain by research associates Juan
Pinedo Reyes and Mark Polzer of the Texas A&M Nautical Archaeology Program revealed the remains of a Phoenician-
era shipwreck of the sixth century B.C. at the Bajo de la Campana site, and paved the way for a full field season in 2008.

The institute’s new website, www.inadiscover.com features all INA projects. Plans are under-
way for a more comprehensive web-based “Virtual Museum of Nautical Archaeology” in partner-
ship with Texas A&M University and other partners as a key element of INA’s strategic plan to deliv-
er more detailed, in-depth scholarship and to augment scholarly content and make data more accessible.

On behalf of the Institute of Nautical Archaeology, we acknowledge the gracious sup-

port of our donors, sponsors and members, and we thank you for your support of INA.

 The INA Annual 2007

 2007 TURKISH COAST SURVEY

George F. BASS

Between 20 September and 7 October 2007, an INA
survey team utilizing the ship Virazon, the catamaran
Millawanda, and the submersible Carolyn, successfully
completed searching the area between Foça and Çeşme
where we had begun a survey in 2006. Although we lost
a week prior to the starting date due to strong winds and
high seas, we still ended the survey days earlier than sched-
uled simply because we had exhausted places to search.
Virazon is the 65–foot (20–meter) ex-U.S. Army T-
boat I first took to Turkey in 1964 on loan from the U.S.
Navy, but which INA purchased outright in 1988. It is
outfitted with sleeping facilities for ten people, a double-
lock recompression chamber, all necessary compressors
and diving equipment, and more recently an air-condi-
tioned computer room. Carolyn was designed specifi-
cally for INA by the Seamagine Hydrospace Corporation
of Claremont, California, to cruise with two people in
a clear acrylic sphere at a depth of 150 feet (46 meters);
buoyant, the submersible is kept at depth by a constantly
turning propeller in a central well, which means it will
float to the surface in case of battery failure. The 45-foot
(14-meter) Millawanda was designed by Merih Karabağ, a
veteran of INA scuba-diving surveys, and built in Istanbul
and Bodrum to transport, launch, and retrieve Carolyn.
Diving for three to four hours at a time in Caro-
lyn, we thoroughly searched the treacherous reefs just

Fig. 1. The submersible Carolyn descending during the 2007 Turkish Coast Survey (all images courtesy INA)

www.inadiscover.com 
Fig. 2. The 2007 Tukish Coast Survey took place between Çeşme and the Karaburun Peninsula.

outside the entrance to Çeşme, especially to the north;
the islands north of Çeşme and Dalyan; the islands and
reefs near Ildır (ancient Erythrai); and the west side
of the Karaburun Peninsula to its northern tip, where
all diving is forbidden, perhaps for military reasons.
Although we frequently saw scatters of
sherds, we located only two certain wrecks:
1. On September 25, just off Karaada’s Ayrıktaş
Burnu, Carolyn pilot Feyyaz Subay and observer Orkan
Köyağasıoğlu spotted Byzantine amphoras and an iron an-
chor at a depth of 125 feet (38 meters). The wreck seems to
be from between the fourth and sixth centuries A.D. Lying
in sand it may preserve hull remains as well as other finds.
2. On October 6, off Kiraz Burnu, not far from Ildır,
Carolyn pilot Orkan Köyağasıoğlu and commissioner
Sinem Özongan spotted a wreck on a slope between 110
and 130 feet deep (33.5–40 meters). Two digital pho-
tographs e-mailed from Virazon to Mark Lawall at the

 The INA Annual 2007

Figs. 3 and 4. Byzantine amphorae, left, off Karaada’s Ayrıktaş Burnu; an amphora belonging to a mid-3rd-century-B.C. shipwreck near
the ancient site of Erythrai, right; all photographed from the submersible Carolyn during the 2007 survey

University of Manitoba brought an instant identification: Acknowledgements

“Wreck 2 is roughly mid-third-century. B.C. with the
complete amphora being from central Ionia, roughly the
area between Ephesos and Miletos; the upper amphora
part could be from the area of Erythrai.” Lawall was un-
aware that the find spot is within sight of ancient Eryth-
rai. The amphoras lie in pockets of sand between rocks,
meaning that there are probably not substantial hull re-
mains, but the site could be worth a summer’s excavation.
INA has on file exact GPS coordinates
for both wrecks, but does not publish these.◆
The staff, all living on Virazon, were George F. Bass,
director; Feyyaz Subay, Virazon captain, Carolyn pilot,
diver, and archaeologist; Claude Duthuit, master diver;
Zafer Gül, Virazon engineer, Carolyn pilot, and diver;
Orkan Köyağasıoğlu, archaeologist, Carolyn pilot, and
diver; Recep Kendirci, Ankara University archaeology
student and diver; Bayram Koşar, Millawanda captain
and diver; Levent Çimen, master seaman, archaeolo-
gist, and diver; Bülent Demirbağ, cook; and Ali Ön-
cel, Virazon oiler. Sinem Özongan, archaeologist and
diver, represented the Turkish Ministry of Culture.

Figs. 5 and 6. A view from the Carolyn as it approaches the Millawanda; the Virazon

www.inadiscover.com 
 THE WESTERN LEDGE REEF WRECK
Research on the Reconstruction of the 16th-centuty Iberian Wreck from Bermuda
Piotr BOJAKOWSKI

Following INA’s long established tradition of re-
searching ships of discovery and exploration, Piotr Boja-
kowski and Katie Custer traveled to Bermuda to analyze
the ship timbers and study the construction methods of
the Western Ledge Reef Wreck (IMHA 3), also known
as Santa Lucia. Although not a new discovery, being
excavated between 1989 and 1991 (Watts, 1993), this
wreck is believed to be one of the best preserved Carib-
bean examples of the late sixteenth-century Iberian ship-
building. Currently, the ship remains and artifacts are
under the curatorship of Edward Harris at the Bermuda
Maritime Museum (BMM) where the INA research team
stayed and worked during the summer of 2007 (fig. 1).

Figs. 1 and 2. View of the Bermuda Maritime Museum (photo

by Piotr Bojakowski); map of Bermuda featuring location
of the Western Ledge Reef Wreck site (map courtesy BMM)

10 The INA Annual 2007

Project Background
The wreck, which is believed to be the Spanish dis-
patch vessel Santa Lucia, was originally discovered in
1964. The remains were located among the treacherous
Bermuda’s western reefs, north-east of the Chubb Heads
navigational beacon (five miles/eight kilometers west
of Bermuda) in about 31 feet (9.4 meters) of water (fig.
2). Soon after the initial discovery, the three divers who
found the remains were joined by Brian Malpas and Don-
ald Canton and formed an association to salvage the site.
This salvage operation was intermittently carried out for
over 25 years producing several small and large artillery
pieces, anchors, Iberian and New World ceramics, a ship’s
bell, a jade amulet, and numerous other artifacts. Coinci-
dently, while conducting research in Bermuda, a student
from the Nautical Archaeology Program (NAP) at Texas
A&M University, Holly Holland, learned about this site.
In 1988, she was hired by Bermuda Maritime Museum to
relocate the shipwreck and conduct a preliminary survey
(F. Hocker, personal communication). During the mid-
summer of 1989, an underwater archaeological team from
East Carolina University (ECU) took over the project. An
agreement was reached and the ECU team, under the di-
rection of Gordon Watts, began systematic and scientific Figs. 3 and 4. Original excavations (photo courtesy of BMM); the
excavations of the wreck (fig. 3). This investigation culmi- author compares 1:1 scale mylar drawing to the original ship timber
nated not only in the full recovery of the hull remains and (photo by Katie Custer).
associated artifacts, but also in the recording of all the hull
timbers during the fall of 1991 (Morris, 1993; Watts, 1993).
Although the metal fasteners were completely cor-
roded, thus almost non-existent, the hull remains were
still in good shape. Once the massive keelson was de-
tached from the structure and lifted to the surface, the
remaining structural elements could be freed. These re-
mains included curiously shaped six mast step buttresses,
limber boards and ceiling planks, as well as frames and
first futtocks. The planking was disassembled by work-
ing from outboard towards the center, and the garboards
were extracted from the keel by cutting the planks in
several places. Finally, in order to make the keel more
manageable for lifting, it too was cut into three pieces.
Once the ship timbers reached the BMM facilities, they
were photographed, drawn on mylar, and placed in
three storage tanks for desalinization. Shortly thereaf-
ter, further progress of the project was delayed and then
completely discontinued, thus the scientific analysis of
the hull as well as the proper conservation of the tim-
bers has been unfinished (Morris, 1993; Watts, 1993).

www.inadiscover.com 11
2007 Season
In an effort to expand our understanding of Iberian
seafaring technology and acquire a compelling topic for a
doctoral dissertation, the author received the permission
of Dr. Harris of the BMM and Dr. Watts to conduct the fi-
nal analysis of the Santa Lucia hull remains. Soon after the
project was approved by the INA Archaeological Commit-
tee, the author was joined by a
fellow nautical student Katie
Custer and visited the BMM to
assess the excavation records
stored in the museum’s ar-
chives. During the first phase
of the project, we reviewed
and copied all of the excavation
materials ranging from the first
survey records from the 1988
Texas A&M excavation, to the
final excavation season and
post-excavation timber record-
ing conducted by ECU, to the
artifact conservation records.
This included notes, reports,
newspaper articles, personal
and official correspondence,
dive-logs, sketches, and draw-
ings. We scanned numerous
field photographs from the
excavations and post-excava- Fig. 5. The author takes pin measurements in the condition of the timbers, we
tion recording. We also cre- museum’s storage tanks (photo by Katie Custer) used an incremental wood borer
ated a provisional inventory
of more than 130 individual timber drawings on mylar. To
facilitate our research, Dr. Harris, executive director of
the BMM, agreed to a temporary loan of the data, which
permitted the author to transport the original and col-
lated materials back to College Station, Texas, for further
study. Dr. Harris also inquired about potential assistance
of the Center for Maritime Archaeology and Conservation
(CMAC) at Texas A&M University in the stabilization and
conservation of the Santa Lucia’s waterlogged timbers.
During the second phase of the project, we examined
1:1-scale mylar drawings by comparing them to the original
timbers (fig. 4). After meticulously testing a majority of the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico parallels such as the High-
drawings by this method, we established that the quality and
the level of accuracy were uniformly high. Next, we began
assessing the physical condition of the timbers stored in
concrete wet storage tanks arranged in a three-tier cascade
system. Upon inspection, we discovered that the timbers
12
stored in the two lower tanks visually appeared to be in good
condition and were completely immersed in water. While
checking the upper third tank, however, we found that the
water level had dropped and barely covered the bottom of
the timbers. Where the timbers had been exposed, all of
the outer surfaces were dry and highly deteriorated. To se-
cure the data from the latter tank, we made drawings of rep-
resentative desiccated timbers
on acetate, created a photo-mo-
saic of the tank, and took wood
samples for further analysis.
To evaluate the level of
external timber deterioration,
we took numerous pin tests on
timbers from all the tanks us-
ing a two-millimeter stainless
steel pin (fig. 5). Even though
this is a subjective test, the pin
method is a helpful and quick
assessment method for any wa-
terlogged wood. Depending
on the timber surface, the pin
measurements stayed on aver-
age between 10–11.6 millime-
ters. We also assessed average
shrinkage and distortion of the
timbers to fall within 8 percent.
To evaluate the internal
and took two core samples. The
first sample came from the center of Frame Three, while
the second sample came from the starboard face of the
keelson. Both samples were securely packed and taken
for further tests and chemical analysis at CMAC. This
portion of the project constituted a crucial element of the
initial evaluation of the external and internal conditions
of the timbers, an evaluation which will determine future
conservation methodology for this remarkable vessel.
Preliminary Data
Unlike other, much less preserved, sixteenth-century
born Cay Wreck, the Molasses Reef Wreck, or the San Es-
teban Wreck, the level of timber and artifact preservation
from the Santa Lucia is phenomenal (Arnold, 1978; Keith,
1985; Oertling and Thomas, 1989; Oertling, 1989). Except
for the missing bow section, the remains comprise almost
The INA Annual 2007
Fig. 6. General dimensions of the keelson/mast step (drawing KN 1/1); all measurements in centimeters (drawing courtesy of BMM, modi-
fied by Piotr Bojakowski)
the entire bottom of the vessel including the keel, keelson,
a mast step and six buttresses, 14 floor timbers including
seven with characteristic dove-tail mortise and tenon joints,
22 first futtocks, bottom planks, ceiling planks, most of the
lower stern assembly, and some loose timber fragments.
Out of all the preserved ship timbers, the Santa Lucia’s
keelson is possibly one of the most interesting and typolog-
ically Iberian pieces. Since it incorporates the mast step in
its expanded central section, this assembly combines two
important functions within one structural element. It pro-
vides great internal longitudinal strength while at the same
time it gives support for the heel of the main mast. Although
the exact wood species awaits more specific identification,
it is certain that the preserved portion of the keelson was
fashioned from a single oak log. At present, the wood is
identified only as a generic European oak, Quercus sp.
The total preserved length of the keelson/mast step
assembly, as illustrated in fig. 6, is 2.22 meters. Apart from
the worm-eaten forward portion, the assembly constitutes
nearly a complete mast step box and an entire aft section of
the keelson proper. Although the fore section of the keel-
son had perished prior to the original excavations, careful
www.inadiscover.com
observations of the pressure marks on the upper surfaces
of at least two floor timbers forward of the master couple
as well as remnants of the fasteners reveal that it was once
present. Currently, the forward most end of the preserved
assembly corresponds with the location of the master cou-
ple and it terminates over the sixth floor timber aft. After
being positioned, the keelson/mast step assembly was
fastened through the floor timbers to the keel with two
round iron bolts, and to a floor timber with a square nail.
The keelson curves slightly up towards the stern, a pat-
tern which corresponds with the rising of the floor timbers,
and its underside is notched to fit over the corresponding
frames. The depths of these notches increase sequentially;
with the shallowest matching the locations of the master
couple and the first floor timber, and the deepest located
at the extremities. The aft end of the keelson bears a strik-
ing resemblance to a horizontal scarf. The presence of such
scarf, as well as the surprisingly short length of the keel-
son/mast step assembly, could potentially suggest a com-
posite construction in which the keelson was made out of
joined together timbers. It is also quite likely that the keel-
son assembly originally extended forward beyond the exist-
13
ing mast step box. The existence of this inferential section edges along the top surfaces of the assembly are beveled,
is confirmed by the presence of distinct pressure marks which was a standard shipbuilding technique. The bottom
on at least two floor timbers forward of the master couple, surface is fashioned with the characteristic notches seam-
and it parallels the keelsons from the other Iberian ship- lessly fitting over the corresponding floor timbers. Such
wrecks, notably the Angra D (Garcia and Monteiro, 1998). an arrangement between notches and floors helped not
Although none of the compo- only to anchor the keelson
nents were preserved, the keelson in place, but also facilitated
shows evidence of at least one bilge an equal distribution of
pump. Its seating was carved on the all of the stresses from the
portside of the mast step box di- main mast and the rigging
rectly aft of the mast mortise. Con- onto the floors. Addition-
trary to the semi-circular sumps ally, the outboard edges
known for other sixteenth-century of the spacers between
Iberian wrecks, a cut away section notches show an interest-
of the Santa Lucia keelson resem- ing reverse “triangular-“
bles a square step (Oertling, 1996). or “chevron-shaped” bevel,
The mast step box is later- which could have reduced
ally supported by six wedge-shaped potential wood splitting as
buttresses; three on the portside well as facilitated the access
and three on the starboard. Their to the bilge for cleaning.
roughly triangular shapes are dis-
rupted along the bottom surface with Conclusion
a distinct step. For the first 19–24 The first season of the
centimeters inboard, the bottom is Western Ledge Reef Wreck
flat and the buttresses rest directly Project (Santa Lucia) was
on the floor timbers. Then, they an overwhelming success.
have a four centimeter-deep rebate Although the author is still
after which their remaining under- in a process of reviewing,
sides rest over the first ceiling strake properly cataloging, and
(fig. 8). It is important to note that analyzing the data the team
the arrangement between the but- brought back from Ber-
tresses and the first ceiling plank, a muda, the largest portion
plank which perfectly fits into the of the work is completed.
notches cut in the undersides of the This portion included scan-
buttresses, is unparalleled with any ning all of the 130 1:1-scale
other such arrangement known from timber drawings into high
the sixteenth-century Iberian-Atlan- resolution TIFFs, scanning
tic shipwrecks. Finally, the spaces Fig. 7. Model of the site of the Western Ledge Reef Wreck more than 600 slides, as
between the buttresses were origi- (courtesy of BMM) well as converting all of the
nally covered with thin longitudinal paper records into PDF for-
boards; two on the portside and two on the starboard. mat. The team also began an exciting process of analyzing
Analogous to the galleon San Juan, it appears that the the hull remains for the reconstruction of this important
Santa Lucia keelson/mast step assembly was most likely Iberian shipwreck already making some interesting discov-
manufactured using broad axes and finished off with adzes eries. For the next and final field season, Bojakowski and
(Loewen, 1998). Consecutive broad axe marks are espe- Custer will return to Bermuda to conduct archival research
cially prominent on the bottom and side surfaces. Simi- on this wreck and review a large collection of historic
larly, the top surface of the mast step box and the inside documents at the BMM, Bermuda Archives, and Bermuda
of the mast mortise predominantly show adze marks. The National Library. Finally, we also would like to review all

14 The INA Annual 2007

Fig. 8. Schematic arrangement between keelson, buttress, first ceiling plank, and stringer (footwale) (drawing by author)
of the artifacts from this wreck, concentrating specifi-
cally on the rigging elements, ordinance, and anchors.◆
Acknowledgements
The author would like to express sincere gratitude
for the support this project has received from INA. I
would like to thank the INA Archaeological Commit-
tee, specifically former president Dr. Donny Hamilton,
current president Dr. James Delgado, and Dr. Kevin
Crisman for their unyielding support. I also would like
to thank INA director George Robb, who generously
provided the grant money which funded the 2007 sea-
son, as well as the BMM, which provided in-kind sup-
port. This project was a great success, potentially shed-
ding light on important nuances of Caribbean wrecks
within the Iberian-Atlantic shipbuilding tradition and
early exploration and colonization of the New World.
References
Arnold, J. B. I., 1978. The Nautical Archae-
ology of Padre Island: The Spanish Ship-
wrecks of 15. Academic Press, New York.
Loewen, B., The Red Bay Vessel: An example of a
16th-century Biscayan ship. Itsas Memoria. Revista de
Estudios Maritimos del Pais Vasco, 2, Untiz Museoa-
Museo Naval, Donostia-San Sebastian, 1998, 193–199.
Garcia C. and Monteiro P., The excavation and dis-
mantling of Angra D, a probable Iberian seagoing
ship, Angra Bay, Terceira Island, Azores, Portugal:
Preliminary Assessment. International Symposium
www.inadiscover.com
on Archaeology of Medieval and Modern Ships of
Iberian-Atlantic Tradition, Lisbon, 1998, 431–447.
Keith, D.H., 1985. Analysis of Hull Remains, Bal-
last, and Artifact Distribution of a 16th Cen-
tury Shipwreck, Molasses Reef, British West In-
dies. Journal of Field Archaeology 12:4, 411–424.
Morris, J. W., 1993. The Preliminary Analysis of the
16th Century Remains Recovered from the West-
ern Ledge Reef Wreck, Bermuda. Bermuda Jour-
nal of Archaeology and Maritime History 5, 58–69.
Oertling, T.J., 1989. The Highborn Cay Wreck:
The 1986 Field Season. IJNA 18:3, 244–253.
__________, 1996. Ships’ Bilge Pumps: A
History of Their Development, 1500–1900.
Texas A&M University Press, College.
Oertling, T.J. and Thomas, J., 1989. Molasses Reef
Wreck Hull Analysis: Final report. IJNA 18:3, 229–243.
Watts, G. P., 1993. Investigation of the 16th Century
Shipwreck on Western Ledge Reef: 1988-1991. Bermuda
Journal of Archaeology and Maritime History 5, 34–57.
Watts, G. P., Broadwater, J., Morris, J. W., and Frank-
lin, M., 1993. A Preliminary Description of the Excava-
tion, Timber Recording, Hull Construction, and Cul-
tural Material Analysis of a Sixteenth-Century Wrecked
on Western Ledge Reef, Bermuda. IJNA 22:2, 103–124.
15
 FINDS FROM HISPALIS
A Byzantine Anchor and Medieval Small Boat From the Ancient Harbor of Seville

Carlos CABRERA TEJEDOR

Of the few known examples of Byzantine shipbuilding,
the most important ones are located in eastern Medi-
terranean. Therefore, report of a Byzantine-style ship
found on the shores of the Guadalquivir River in Se-
ville, Spain, seemed quite an unusual and important
discovery. That was the main reason why, thanks to the
In 1981, during the preliminary construction works of
Seville’s subway at a public square, Plaza Nueva, abundant
archaeological remains from the Iberian to the Islamic peri-
ods were found. Among these discoveries were the remains
of a small ship found in the substrate at a depth of eleven
meters. Unfortunately, the cofferdam supporting the walls

Fig. 1. The ship’s remains in the moment of the discovery in the substrate of the Plaza Nueva of Seville (photo courtesy Seville
Archaeological Museum)

support of the Institute of Nautical Archaeology, I trav- of one of the access pits to the subway tunnels had split the
eled to Seville in June 2007 to inspect the remains small ship into two pieces, destroying the ship’s starboard
of a wooden ship and an iron anchor that was appar- side as well as the aft part of the vessel. The remaining
ently built in the Byzantine Empire in the sixth century. ship’s structures, such as a part of the keel, several frames

16 The INA Annual 2007

Fig. 2. A map of the Guadalquivir river basin and the location of Seville in southwestern Spain
and planks, the keelson and the stempost were recovered,
but they had been severely damaged from earlier bulldozer
excavation of the access pit. Four meters underneath the
ship, at 15 meters of depth, another item was found: an iron
anchor surrounded by three marble column shafts and Ibe-
rian and Dressell 8, 11, 17, 19, 20 amphora sherds (fig. 1).
Although the wooden remains of the small boat were
deposited in the Seville Archaeological Museum, they were
never seriously studied. The first bibliographical reference
of them—and therefore of the ship—appeared seven years
after the discovery. This publication briefly described and
cataloged the discovery as “Seville Ship” and identified
the wooden remains of the ship as Byzantine. The sup-
port for this chronological hypothesis was based solely
on the relation of the ship remains to the anchor found
underneath the vessel, which has Byzantine typological
characteristics such as a cruciform shape. According to
chronicles and historical accounts, the Byzantine forces
under Justinian I controlled Seville during three differ-
www.inadiscover.com
ent periods: from 552 to 567, from 580 to 583, and in 610.
(The veracity of the last date, however, is unclear and still
in debate for some scholars.) Thus, the Byzantine occupa-
tion of Seville served to date the discovery of the vessel and
anchor back to the second half of the sixth century A.D.
Paleographical Background
The geomorphology of the city of Seville has changed
with the passing of time. Scholars place the origin of the
settlement on a small hill surrounded and connected with
the salt-water lagoons and the Baetis River, the ancient
Roman name for the Guadalquivir. In the second half of
the eighth century B.C., the Phoenicians either estab-
lished a colony or started to interact with an already estab-
lished Iberian settlement. The Phoenician name for this
settlement was Spal. In the first century B.C., under or-
ders from Julius Caesar, a Roman colony was established
at the same location: Hispalis. This well-documented Ro-
man colony was an important harbor for the Baetica re-
17
gion. The hill area where the colony was established was forming a cross. The measurements of the anchor remains
surrounded by several riverbeds until the thirteenth cen- are ca. 172 centimeters tall by ca. 83 centimeters wide.
tury. The number of original riverbeds and the changes The anchor is partially preserved and, before its
that occurred in the thirteenth century are still debated by discovery, had lost the aft part of the shank including
scholars; however, it seems clear that at least one riverbed the ring and the elliptical aperture for a moveable stock.
did existed until the thirteenth century (fig. 3). This minor The anchor also had lost the moveable stock, half of one
riverbed connected the main riverbed of the Guadalqui- of the arms and the projecting crown. Taking into ac-
vir from north to south and was located in the middle of count the missing parts, the reconstructed overall dimen-
today’s Seville downtown. It was in this riverbed where sions of the anchor would be ca. 220 by. 130 centimeters.
the original harbor of Spal, and later Hispalis, Ishbiliya The shank has a cylindrical section, being wider near
(the name of the city when it was under Muslim rule in the its juncture with the arms. The arms are 40 centimeters
medieval period), and, eventually, Seville, was located. in length in a rectangular section without counting the
The location of the original harbor is the reason fluke. The completely preserved arm turns up at its end
why maritime remains, as a ship, an anchor, and am- with an inclination of 45º while simultaneously tapering
phora sherds, were recovered from the substrate of the down in thickness to a flat edge. As the arm turns up, it
today’s Seville downtown. Besides the finds described also narrows down to about three-quarters of its maxi-
in this article, at least two more shipwreck remains ap- mum width and then widen again to form the flat fluke
peared in the second half of the twentieth century, spe- as it turns up. The fluke of 20 centimeters in length is
cifically in the area where the lost riverbed was located. poorly developed, being no wider than the main body of
Unfortunately, it appears that there was a lack of archae- the arms. The arm does not posses what might properly
ological intervention at the time of their discovery, and called a palm, since it does not have a flat upper surface.
very little information has been recorded about them. The dimensions of the anchor give us a hint about
the size of the vessel which carried and lost it. Consid-
The Anchor ering the dimensions of the anchor, we may state that
Unlike the boat remains,
the anchor was studied in
detail by a Spanish scholar.
Currently on display at the
Archaeological Museum of
Seville, the anchor undoubt-
edly belongs to the Byzan-
tine tradition due its shape
and characteristics (fig. 4). It
was made using the forged-
welded technique with sev-
eral iron pieces in a cruci-
form shape. The longitudinal
axe of the two arms joined
together to form a single
straight line which is perpen-
dicular to the longitudinal
axis of the shank, thereby

Fig. 3. The reconstructed position

of the lost riverbed of the Gua-
dalquivir River in Seville (image
supplied by Carlos Cabrera Teje-
dor)

18 The INA Annual 2007

the vessel may have been fairly large. A journal hypoth-
esizes about the possibility of the ship being a dromon,
yet this idea appears to be supported only by the fact
that these types of vessels were used by the Byzantine
Empire. Taking into account the little evidence avail-
able, nothing more can be said except that it almost cer-
tainly dates back to the second half of the sixth century.
The Seville anchor is similar to those found on the sev-
enth-century A.D. Yassı Ada shipwreck. It is particularly
comparable with anchor number seven, since both possess
practically identical overall dimensions and morphology.
Perhaps the vessel that lost this anchor in Seville had similar
characteristics to the shipwreck that sank in Turkish waters.
The Ship
Following the discovery of the Seville Ship in 1981,
the wooden remains of the vessel were taken to the Seville
Archaeological Museum, where preventive conservation
measures were taken. According to current museum cu-
rator Diego Oliva, museum staff solicited the advice of a
conservator from the National Archaeology Museum of
Madrid, who recommended that the vessel remains be bur-
ied in a large coffer of sand. The sand-filled coffer and the
wooden remains contained therein were kept wet through
the process of watering the sand of the with tap water on a
daily basis. Unfortunately, at some point during the 1980s,
the watering process was discontinued. In the late 1990s
the wooden remains were extracted from the coffer and
placed in twelve PVC boxes where I subsequently found
them in desiccated and in a state of extremely poor preser-
vation. The boxes, stored in the basement of the museum,
are labeled with the approximate area of the ship—aft or
forward—that their wooden contents were recovered from.
The timber remains are not very large. Based on
their size, my first impression was that these remains
were likely to be- long to a small boat rather
than a ship. It stands to the reason that an an-
chor of almost more
than two meters in
length could not belong
to a small boat. There-
fore, I realized that the boat remains
could not been related to the anchor. Fig. 4. The sixth-century Byzantine anchor
While inspecting the remains, my found underneath the ship; currently on
objective was to identify any typologi- display at the Seville Archaeological Museum section with an exterior protru-
cal shipbuilding construction features (photo by Carlos Cabrera Tejedor)
that could relate the remains to Byzan-
tine shipbuilding traditions from the
www.inadiscover.com
sixth century. Thus, planks, frames, joints, nails, etc.
were examined and documented. Due to the short of
length of my visit—one day—I documented the timber
remains by taking photos with a digital camera, mak-
ing measurements, and sketching some details. The
overall results of the brief survey are as follows:
The average thickness of the planking is
smaller than two centimeters. This thickness does
not provide enough space in order to create mor-
tises for tenon placement. In fact, after inspecting
all the remains I could not find any trace of mor-
tises or tenons. The single joinery method found
in the remains was iron fastenings. Iron nails were
found that have a square body section with a circu-
lar rounded head. The average length of the nails
ranges from ca. 8–15 centimeters (fig. 5). The
thickness of the planking and the size and length
of the nails also supports the hypothesis that the
remains probably belong to a small size boat.
Among the timbers, several pieces were iden-
tified as remains of the boat’s frames. These frames
were square in section and around 10 centimeters
thick. The frames are broken in pieces and none
is completely preserved. Therefore, is difficult to
know the original length of them, but taking in
consideration the size of the fragments—no big-
ger than 50 centimeters each—I estimated that the
frames probably were not bigger than two meters
at the amidships of the boat. In one of the original
photos from the salvage, at least seven evenly dis-
tributed frames appeared from the stem to amid-
ships (fig. 6). Therefore, the original total number
of frames were more than seven and probably less
than twenty. The remains of the frames have two
centimeter-square limber holes to permit water to
freely move in the bilge (fig. 7). It appears that each
frame originally had from two to four limber holes.
Some heavier timbers seem to be the pre-
served remains of the keel, keelson,
and stempost. These fragmented
remains are very warped; therefore,
it is extremely difficult to identify
them properly. The keel appears
to have had an inverted trapezoid
sion. The inner part of the keel is
no wider than 10 centimeters and
the exterior protruding part of
19
the keel is around 2 by 1.5 centi-
meters. About the keelson and the
stempost, beside the information
from the photos of the salvage, it
is difficult to say anything in their
regard due to their poor preserva-
tion status; they are timbers not
wider than 20 centimeters with
a square or trapezoidal section.
The planks were nailed to the
frames from the exterior to the inte-
rior of the hull. The planks were also
nailed to the keel and stempost us-
ing the same method. Frames were
nailed to the keel and the keelson
was nailed on top of the frames. All
of these details suggest that the skel-
eton-first construction procedure
with carvel planking method was
employed to build this small boat.
The size of the wooden re-
mains, the lack of mortises and Figs. 5 and 6. Original photo from the salvage excavation of the Seville Ship—which is bisected
tenons, and the presence of iron by a cofferdam built to shore up a construction access pit—in which at least seven frames ap-
nails suggest that the Seville Boat pear (photo courtesy Seville Archaeological Museum); three nails from the remains of the boat
was built in a period later than the (photo by Carlos Cabrera Tejedor)
sixth century A.D. and, therefore,
belonged to a shipbuilding tradi-
tion different from the Byzantine.
The boat must belong to a period
earlier than the thirteenth century
A.D., however, since the location
where the remains were found,
the Plaza Nueva, was later the site
of the Convent of San Francisco.
This convent was built in 1258
and destroyed by a fire in 1810.
In 1840, the ruins of the convent
were demolished and the public
square was built. Therefore, the
small boat probably belongs to the
medieval period. Perhaps the boat
belongs to the period between
711 and 1090 A.D. when Ishbiliya
(Seville) was under Muslim rule.
After the inspection of
the remains, I had an interview
with museum director Fernando
Fernández Gómez. Fernández was

20 The INA Annual 2007

the archaeologist who was in charge of salvage excava-
tions at the time of the discovery of the Seville Ship, and
he supervised the recovery of the boat remains in 1981.
He described the different archaeological levels that
the excavation discovered, confirming how the subway
works split the boat’s remains with the cofferdam. The
boat and the anchor remains were found at different ar-
chaeological levels, he reported, with the former found at
Fig. 7. One of the frame fragments featuring a limber hole and an iron nail in the upper right (photo by Carlos Cabrera Tejedor)
11 meters from the surface and the latter found four me-
ters underneath the boat at 15 meters from the surface.
Fernández also described that the boat re-
mains were no bigger than 10 meters in length and
looked like a small fishing boat. In addition, he con-
firmed the scarcity of published data on the ship.
The boat was found in an archaeological level in
where medieval (Islamic) pottery sherds were found, and
medieval sherds surrounded the boat remains. This fact
supports the hypothesis that the remains kept in the base-
ment of the museum could belong to a medieval small
boat built according to the Islamic shipbuilding tradi-
tion. As mentioned above, the anchor was found four
meters underneath the boat, at 15 meters from the sur-
face and in a different archaeological level than the boat.
Finally, underneath the archaeological level where
the anchor was found, Roman archaeological material
appeared at ca. 18 meters of depth. Therefore, the ar-
chaeological level where the anchor was found—that is,
between medieval and Roman remains—supports the dat-
ing of the anchor back to the late Roman medieval period
when the Byzantine domination of Seville took place.
www.inadiscover.com
Therefore, I suggest that the anchor and boat found in
Seville in 1981 are not related. The anchor is clearly Byzan-
tine, probably from the second half of the sixth century and
belonging to a relatively large vessel. The remains of the
vessel are of a small fishing boat that probably belongs to a
later medieval period, perhaps the Islamic period between
711 and 1090 A.D. Even though the boat remains do not
belong to the Byzantine period and culture, they are still
important for a better understanding of the history of ship-
building. Little information regarding Islamic shipbuilding
is known. Therefore, a detailed study of these timber re-
mains would result in interesting and productive research.
Besides the historical and archaeological information that
we could obtain from these remains, the conservation of
the timbers itself constitutes a challenge. The union of
these two challenges—conservation and timber study—is
an endeavor that should be pursued in the near future.◆
Acknowledgments
I want to express my gratitude to the Institute of
Nautical Archaeology and Kevin Crisman, head of the
Nautical Archaeology Program at Texas A&M University,
for generously supporting this research. I also want to ex-
press my gratefulness to the research staff of the Archaeo-
logical Museum of Seville: Fernando Fernández Gómez,
director, for his help, comments and collaboration; and
Diego Oliva, curator, for his assistance and comments.
21
 LEAVING NO STONE UNTURNED
The 2007 Excavation Season at Kızılburun, Turkey
Deborah N. Carlson and Carrie E. Atkins

For ten weeks during the summer of 2007, a team
of undergraduate and graduate students, visiting
archaeologists, and staff of INA’s Bodrum Research Center
continued the excavation of a shipwrecked marble carrier
at Kızılburun, Turkey (fig. 1). The 2007 Kızılburun team
was made up of individuals from six countries (Turkey,
United States, United Kingdom, Belgium, Greece, and
Croatia), and included four graduate students from the
Nautical Archaeology Program at Texas A&M University.
Donny Hamilton served as the Project Director until
mid-July, when Deborah Carlson assumed that post until
the end of the field season in late August. Ms. Gülnaz
Savran of the Muğla Preservation Council served as
the representative of the Turkish Ministry of Culture.
Generously supported by the National Geographic Society,
Spiegel Television, the Samuel H. Kress Foundation,
Texas A&M University, and the directors and friends of the
Institute of Nautical Archaeology, the 2007 field season
marked the third consecutive campaign at Kızılburun
and the second season devoted to removal of the ship’s
marble cargo in search of surviving wooden hull remains.
The marble carrier currently under excavation
is one of five shipwrecks discovered at Kızılburun on
a 1993 INA survey directed by Cemal Pulak (The INA

Fig. 1. The Kızılburun cape, with INA’s Virazon moored in front of the excavation camp and the catamaran Millawanda marking the
approximate location of the column wreck (photo by Bastian Seidel)

22 The INA Annual 2007

Quarterly 21.4). This vessel was transporting a cargo of objects, including pedestalled basins and grave markers.
newly-quarried white marble from the island of Marmara A wide variety of ceramic artifacts associated with the
(ancient Proconnesus) in the sea of the same name, when column wreck includes wine jugs, drinking cups, plates,
it sank off Kızılburun, probably some time in the first moldmade bowls, and oil lamps, as well as fragments
three quarters of the first century B.C. There are several of coarseware pans, lidded casseroles, and transport
features of the Kızılburun amphoras from the Adriatic,
marble cargo that distinguish East Greece, and the Black
it from other shipwrecked Sea. Many of these pieces are
marble shipments discovered typical Late Hellenistic shapes
around the Mediterranean: that were circulated widely
first, the depth of the site around the Mediterranean,
(40–50 meters) appears to while others—like the three
have minimized significantly Colchian amphoras from
or prevented altogether any the wreck—represent the
attempts to salvage artifacts only known examples from
from the wreck. Second, a shipwreck context. The
the largest and heaviest of ongoing conservation,
the architectural marbles at reconstruction, and analysis
Kızılburun are not blocks or of this ceramic corpus may
monolithic column shafts, provide our best hope of
but eight large drums and refining even further the date
a single Doric capital that of the Kızılburun shipwreck.
together create most or all of In 2006, with the help
a monumental Doric column, of four 1,800-kilogram lifting
almost certainly destined balloons donated to us by
to complete the façade Richard Fryburg of Subsalve,
of a temple. New temple Inc., we began the process of
construction in the Doric rigging and moving off site
style, however, is a relatively the wreck’s massive marble
rare phenomenon in the first column drums, which weigh
century B.C., which suggests approximately seven tons a
that it will be possible to piece. Each drum was outfitted
narrow the list of candidates with a ‘basket’ of three nylon
to a handful of sites. Third, lifting straps, carefully
the unity and integrity of worked into place under
these eight drums, which were Fig. 2. Orkan Köyağasioğlu and Feyyaz Subay make a final in- the very bottom surface,
discovered arranged neatly in spection of the rigging on the Doric capital. which was often situated
four pairs much like they must directly atop fragmentary
have been positioned inside the and very fragile wooden
ship’s hold, implied that portions of the vessel’s wooden timbers. At the conclusion of the 2006 season, we had
hull may be preserved beneath them. The opportunity to successfully and safely relocated half of the eight drums
study and learn more about the construction details of (nos. 5, 6, 7, and 8), leaving four drums and the column
what is likely to have been a purpose-built marble carrier capital in situ; raising these remaining marbles was
was a compelling factor in undertaking this excavation. the focus of our efforts at the start of the 2007 season.
Two previous seasons of excavation (The INA Before the renewal of archaeological work could
Quarterly 33.1, 34.1) have revealed that, in addition to proceed, however, a small group of local carpenters led
the primary column cargo, the Kızılburun ship was also by INA staff member Mehmet Çiftlikli spent four days
transporting smaller quantities of roughly-finished marble at Kızılburun rebuilding several vital camp structures

www.inadiscover.com 23
Figs. 3. and 4. Drum 4 rigged with the Lift-All slings in a triple
choker hitch, moments after it was lifted off the seabed; two of the
four levering bosses are visible along the bottom edge (photo by
Sheila Matthews); Carrie Atkins prepares the excavated planks
in U6 (area Under drum 6) to be lifted and brought to the surface
(photo by Don Frey).
damaged or destroyed by rough winter weather. The
initial 15-person excavation team, already assembled at
INA Headquarters in Bodrum, arrived at Kızılburun on
June 4 with INA’s research vessel Virazon and catamaran
Millawanda. Archaeological working dives began just over
a week later, following the completion of the check-out and
acclimation dive sequence and the installation of safety
tanks, the telephone booth, datum towers, and airlift pipes.
Our first goal of the 2007 season was to complete
the process, initiated the previous year, of ballooning off
site each of the monumental seven-ton marble drums. We
were extremely fortunate to have at our disposal an array
of polyester lifting slings, manufactured by Lift-All, Inc.
and provided at no expense to the Kızılburun project by
Lift-All president Jeff Klibert. These continuous loop
slings, which stretch very little and are abrasion-resistant,
made it possible to rig and lift each drum by the side
wall, without disturbing any of the fragmentary wood
remains preserved beneath (The INA Quarterly 34.3).
As we had little practical experience with this new
technology, Virazon captain Feyyaz Subay spent much
of the first two weeks at Kızılburun experimenting with
different combinations of slings and hitches, and testing
them on several of the drums moved off site in 2006. In
the end, we settled upon a triple choker hitch assembly,
securing the opposing slings to one another with shackles
to prevent the rig from riding too high or slipping off the
24
drum. We proceeded with the same balloon configuration
utilized in 2006, attaching two 1,800-kilogram lift
balloons to a chain directly above each drum, and securing
the two other “control balloons” to the top of the chain in
approximately 10 meters of water. The two deeper balloons
were filled first, and then the shallower two were filled
remotely, via a hose supplied with air from tanks in a dinghy
at the surface. This use of control balloons near the surface
ensured that when all the balloons were filled and the drum
left the seabed, there was no chance of the balloons (and
the drum attached to them!) becoming overly buoyant and
shooting to the surface. Thus, when the upper balloons
broke the surface of the water, a recovery dive team was
dispatched to the wreck to complete the relocation of the
drum to an open, sandy area away from the wreck (in less
than 20 minutes!). This process was achieved by filling
smaller balloons attached to the drum with lines that ran
through pulleys secured to the seabed. When the smaller
balloons were inflated, they pulled on the lines that guided
the drum downward onto the seabed. The addition of the
Lift-All lifting slings constituted a vast improvement over
the more time-consuming technique employed in 2006.
The INA Annual 2007
 Most of the 2007 team spent the first week under
water removing rocks and sand overburden from the area
upslope of the drum pile. At the same time, a smaller group
experimented with the lifting slings, carefully observing
their properties under water by test-rigging drums 5 and
7, which had been moved off site in
2006. On June 19, we removed
the single six-ton Doric capital
from the top of the drum pile (fig.
2), and began airlifting sand away
from the center of the remaining
four drums in preparation for
their removal. In fewer than two
weeks, we safely and successfully
lifted and moved the last four
remaining marble column
drums (nos. 1, 2, 3, and 4).
Only drum 4, the largest
and heaviest of all eight drums,
came with some difficulty, as the
initial surge off the seabed caused
one of the two upper balloons to
tip and partially deflate at the
surface, sending drum 4 back
toward the bottom, directly atop
one of our rebar mapping stakes,
which it bent like a clenched nail. Fig. 5. Tentative reconstruction of the clenched nails transverse timbers had been removed,
But when the upper balloons in four transverse timbers from U6 (drawing by Carrie we observed at least one additional
were re-inflated minutes later Atkins)
and drum 4 bounded back into
the water column, it was possible
to see that the bottom edge of the drum is distinguished
by four small rectangular protrusions or ‘feet’ (fig. 3).
These feet are the levering bosses designed to facilitate
the final positioning of the drum by sliding it along a stone
foundation; their presence confirms not only that drum 4
was intended to serve as the bottommost drum, but also
that we are dealing with a column of the Doric order, since
Doric columns sat directly atop the foundation course
and not atop a base like Ionic and Corinthian columns.
On July 5, with all the column drums safely relocated
off site, we turned our attention toward the excavation
and recovery of the fragmentary timbers that we had
glimpsed beneath drums 5 and 6 during the previous
summer season. Drum 6 was the last to be moved at the
close of the 2006 season, leaving us time only to cover,
but not investigate, the wood that was visible when
the drum had been raised. With the drum-lifting now
www.inadiscover.com
complete, Texas A&M University graduate student Carrie
Atkins began working in U6 (which designates the area
Under drum 6), where she uncovered, in the uppermost
layer, five longitudinal planking runs, each at least 9–10
centimeters wide and 2–5 centimeters thick (fig. 4).
Beneath these planks in U6 were
six thick, transverse timbers, each
roughly 12–15 centimeters wide (sided)
and 8–10 centimeters thick (molded).
These thick timbers were better
preserved toward the interior part of
the ship, but in only one case was it
possible to identify what appears to
be a clean, finished edge with original
surface. It became increasingly
apparent that the transverse timbers
had been fastened fairly regularly
with clenched copper nails, but the
clenched nail tips appeared on the
molded, not the sided faces (fig. 5). In
other words, these timbers seem not
to have been attached to planking in
the manner of a ship’s frames. Carrie’s
work in U6 progressed slowly, due to
the delicate and fragmentary nature
of the wood remains. Once the six
timber, roughly square in cross-
section, oriented longitudinally in the
same manner as the thin planking atop
the six timbers. Regrettably, there was not sufficient time
to investigate this area completely, but the arrangement of
the excavated timbers and the curious orientation of the
clenched nails suggest that the wood remains in U6 are
either (a) toppled half frames that were wrenched out of
place and rolled 90°, or (b) some type of internal framework,
such as a pallet, for supporting or bracing the drum(s).
On the western side of the site, under drums 1, 3,
and 5 we exposed, mapped, and raised four thick and
roughly-worked rectangular marble slabs of varying
dimensions (labeled BAP, BAR, BAS, and BAT). With
the two slabs raised in 2006 (BAK and BAL), this brings
the total number to six, oriented in a line parallel to the
keel (or where the keel should be), on one side of the ship
only. Around and beneath these marble slabs, we exposed
fragmentary remains of additional wooden timbers,
comprised primarily of more transverse timbers lying
25
 Fig 6. Site plan from the 2007 season (drawing by Sheila Matthews)
atop badly broken longitudinal planking (fig. 6). Within
this planking we observed several examples of pegged
mortise-and-tenon edge joinery, which is precisely the
construction technique one would expect to have been
used for the hull of a seagoing ship of the first century B.C.
Four wood samples collected from U3 and analyzed
by Israeli researcher Nili Liphschitz of Tel Aviv University
indicate that the thin longitudinal timbers are of black pine
(Pinus nigra) while the thicker transverse timbers are a
species of ash (Fraxinus excelsior). Black pine is a common
species in the eastern Mediterranean, used for planking
26
the hulls of ancient ships like the first century B.C.
merchantman excavated at Madrague de Giens, France.
The ancients knew ash to be a strong, durable hardwood
with a high moisture content, which allowed it to be bent
easily when green (Vitruvius, de Architectura 2.9.11). The
archaeological evidence for its use by ancient shipwrights,
however, is scarce; three half-frames near the stern of
the Madrague de Giens ship were of ash, suggesting it
was well-suited for use in areas that required additional
strength (Theophrastus, Historia Plantarum 5.7.1–3).
While most of the 2007 team dedicated themselves
The INA Annual 2007
to the excavation, labeling, photography, and mapping
of this extremely delicate wood (fig. 7), a small group
took on the task of gathering more specific dimensional
data on the ship’s marble architectural elements. Our
proficiency with the Lift-All slings made it possible to
flip each of the eight drums 180° so as to expose the
cleaner face, free of centuries of marine overgrowth
(fig. 7). Each of the drums was then marked with small
dots of high-contrast modeling clay and photographed
extensively. The results are three-dimensional digital
models of the eight drums and capital, which will aid our
efforts to pinpoint the intended destination and function
of this monumental column, as well as better understand
the specific weight distribution inside the ship’s hold.
As the excavation entered its second month, stormy
seas on July 12 forced the morning evacuation of the Virazon
and Millawanda, but the vessels returned in the afternoon
and working dives continued uninterrupted. A week later,
team spirits were buoyed by a visit from INA director Lucy
Darden and her grandsons Chris and Frank. On the very
next day, July 20, the team dispersed for a three-day break
that coincided with the Turkish parliamentary elections.
During this hiatus, veteran team member Kris Trego, a
Ph.D. candidate at the University of Cincinnati, joined
Deborah on a day-trip to nearby Claros, to visit the remains
of the Temple of Apollo (see map inset, fig. 1). This was a
Doric temple of white marble, initiated in the third century
B.C. but still unfinished when the Greek travel writer
Pausanias visited the site 500 years later (Description
of Greece 7.5.4). Excavations by French archaeologists
throughout much of the twentieth century have exposed
significant portions of the temple’s foundations,
subterranean oracular shrine, and Doric column drums, Fig. 7. The drum garden, where we flipped each of the column
the dimensions of which bear a striking resemblance to drums once moved away from the wreck (photo by Don Frey)
the unfinished drums at Kızılburun. In 2008, Deborah
met with French and Turkish archaeologists working at the successful relocation of the ship’s column capital and
Claros to discuss further these conspicuous similarities. all eight drums, we estimate that the Kızılburun shipwreck
When work resumed at Kızılburun following the excavation is nearing completion; of course, this estimation
Turkish elections, we greeted our friends from Spiegel depends in large part on the quantity and quality of the
Television, who joined us as they had in 2006, to film the unexcavated wooden hull remains, which are a complete
excavation in preparation for a documentary that appeared unknown; either we have scratched the surface of what
on German television in September (2008). Archaeological may be a well-preserved hull of the late Hellenistic period,
work continued in earnest until August 17, when we began or there is little left to uncover beyond the fragments that
breaking down the camp and packaging the artifacts for have been raised thus far. In either case, we aim to return
transport by truck to Bodrum. On August 20, the Kızılburun to Kızılburun in 2009 to solve this interesting puzzle; in
artifacts were signed over to Yaşar Yıldız, interim director the interim, the summer of 2008 has been designated a
of the Museum of Underwater Archaeology in Bodrum, study season, dedicated to researching the thousands of
where they are presently undergoing conservation. With artifacts already raised from this important shipwreck.◆

www.inadiscover.com 27
Acknowledgments
On behalf of the entire 2007 Kızılburun excavation
team, we extend our sincere thanks to project director
Donny Hamilton, commissioner Gülnaz Savran, the
Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism, and the Turkish
Coast Guard. Our success in moving the last of the marble
column drums was due to the superb support of our friends
at Lift-All, including president Jeff Klibert, engineer
Andy Graf, those employees at the Houston plant where
our slings were manufactured practically overnight, and
sales manager Tim Gauss, who hand-delivered the slings
to Deborah just two days before she flew to Turkey.
While on site, executive chef Fran White kept us all
fortified with a seemingly endless supply of hot and tasty
meals. Divemasters Vassilis Tsairis and Murat Tilev saw
us safely through almost 1500 dives to the wreck site,
and we were equally fortunate to be under the care of
four talented hyperbaric interns from Çapa University
(Gamze Öztürk, Sevi Tekin, Bengüsü Orodlu, and Ayşen
Kolat), who served as our staff physicians for the duration
of the season. Hüseyin and Muhittin Aldemir cheerfully
attended to our many other needs, which included (but
were not limited to) fuel, oxygen, drinking water, and
weekly transportation. Special thanks also go out to
our friend Murat Özakat for his generosity in allowing
our fleet to utilize the fine facilities at Alaçatı harbor.
Over the course of almost three months in the field, our
tireless team of 20 was reinforced by archaeologists Irena
Radič, Susan Rotroff, and her husband Bob Lamberton.
Welcome guests included INA director Lucy Darden and
her grandsons Chris and Frank, David and Julia Koch (who
generously provided this group of weary archaeologists
with a stunning season-ending beach barbecue), Harun
Özdaş, Ekin Özker, Tufan Turanlı, and visiting physicians
Jim Hardy, Jen Harris, Chris Mills, Allison Mulcahy, and
Akın Toklu. Back in Bodrum, Asaf Oron and the talented
staff of the Bodrum Museum Conservation Laboratory, to
which artifact illustrator Özgün Alpdoğan is the newest
addition, ensured that the delivery and processing of
artifacts went as smoothly as possible, while the rest of the
INA staff always make the Bodrum Research Center a most
welcome retreat at the end of an unforgettable summer
spent along a remote stretch of the Turkish coast.

The 2007 Kızılburun team (front row, from left): Gülnaz Savran, Kim Rash, Bayram Kosar, Feyyaz Subay, Ege Savran,
Don Frey, Johan Opdebeeck, Mike McGlin, Carrie Atkins, Fran White / (back row, from left): Zafer Gül, Giles Richard-
son, Sheila Matthews, Heather Brown, Kris Trego, Donny Hamilton, Murat Tilev, Debbie Carlson, Kruno Zubcic, Nicolle
Hirschfeld, Eric Kemp, Vassilis Tsiairis, Sevi Tekin. Not pictured: Faith Hentschel, Courtney Higgins, Ayşen Kolat, Or-
kan Köyağasioğlu, Gamze Öztürk, Bengüsü Orodlu, Fred Roelens, Jeroen Vermeersch.

28 The INA Annual 2007

 LAKE ONTARIO MARITIME CULTURAL
LANDSCAPE PROJECT, 2007 SEASON
Gunboats, Shipyards, and Haydocks
Ben FORD

The purpose of the Lake Ontario Maritime Cultural fact collections were also reviewed and photographed.
Landscape Project is to integrate underwater and terres- The submerged portions of the survey areas were sur-
trial archaeology into a holistic study of the shoreline. His- veyed using magnetometer, side-scan sonar, and divers.
tory shows that both Native- and Euro-Americans moved Both the side-scan sonar and magnetometer equipment
readily between water and land, making use of both envi- were on-loan from INA (fig. 2). In water deeper than ap-
ronments for transportation, trade, communication, and proximately three meters, the remote sensing equipment
recreation. Archaeologists, however, have generally creat- was employed along transects spaced 15 meters apart. All
ed an artificial division in studying past human activity with potential targets were inspected by divers. In water less than
“terrestrial” and “underwa- three meters deep,
ter” sub-fields, creating a divers swam transects
distinction that members of 3–5 meters apart and
an earlier culture or group oriented perpendicu-
may not have recognized. lar to the shore. There
In an attempt to partially was substantial over-
bridge this divide, the Lake lap between the diving
Ontario Maritime Cultural and remote sensing
Landscape Project is a sur- portions of the survey,
vey of seven single square- and the magnetometer
kilometer areas along the was worked into very
eastern margin of Lake shallow water in order
Ontario. Each of the seven to identify possible
survey areas (four of which buried artifacts. All ar-
were surveyed during 2007, chaeological remains
fig. 1) is situated so that half were recorded in situ
Fig. 1. Map of Lake Ontario, highlighting general survey area (all figures by
of the area is on land and the author) and the coordinates
half is submerged, thereby were obtained from
spanning the shoreline and a differential GPS
drawing on both terrestrial and underwater archeological linked to the remote sensing software. All marine survey work
techniques. This research also combines prehistoric and was conducted from the INA 18-foot Achilles inflatable and
historic archaeology, ranging from ca. 5,000 years ago (the all of the equipment was powered by a bank of car batteries.
approximate date of lake-level stabilization) to 1900 A.D.
The 2007 survey season was conducted during Sherwin Bay
seven weeks in July and August. Each survey began with The Sherwin Bay survey area (number 1 on fig. 3)
informant interviews to gather local knowledge and an- identified one late nineteenth- century dock, a nineteenth-
ecdotes, and to request land-owner permission. Many of century farmstead, and several artifacts in the possession
the terrestrial sites were identified through this process. of local residents, including a Contact Period trade axe.
Where permission was granted, archaeologists walked This area also included the likely site of a Contact Period
the property looking for exposed evidence of archaeo- camp where Father Dablon, the seventeenth-century ge-
logical sites. Identified sites were recorded with GPS, ographer and superior-general of Jesuit missions in New
photography, maps, and a written description. Arti- France and his followers were forced to spend several

www.inadiscover.com 29
days after wrecking their bateau. This area,
however, was less productive than the oth-
ers because its flat rock bottom permit-
ted winter ice to regularly scrape the bay
clean, and because high bacteria counts in
the bay made it unsafe for diver inspections

Long Carrying Place

The second area (fig. 3, number 2) is
the Long Carrying Place on Point Peninsu-
la. This narrow bay takes its name from the
portage route that began and ended here.
From the end of the bay it was an approxi-
mately one mile (1.5-kilometer) trek across
the isthmus to a stretch of beach sheltered
by Fox and Grenadier Islands, where boats
could be put back into the water. There is
some indication that Champlain was taken
over this route during his tour of the lakes.
Eight archaeological sites were
identified in this area, as well as one iso-
lated find. The isolated find consisted of a
5.5-meter-long white oak timber that may
have been lost from a timber raft originat-
ing at the Cherry Island lumbering opera-
tion. The archaeological sites in the area Fig. 2. Jessi Halligan preparing the survey vessel for marine remote sensing. Note
include the remains of a log cabin, three the side-scan sonar on the port gunwale and the magnetometer on the starboard.
historic farmsteads, a blacksmith shop, at
least two prehistoric sites, and a hay-dock ing the 1990s and no artifacts were visible on the surface.
with associated barn. Haydocks are often-rudimentary However, the site is situated on a point controlling access
docks used to load locally produced grains onto small ves- to the portage and with easy access to the water. It is also a
sels for shipment to larger ports where the grains are ac- substantial distance from the historic road, suggesting that
cumulated and exported to market. There may be other it was intended to be approached by water rather than land.
sites situated in the inlet, as we recorded several magnetic Two of the farmsteads, one standing, the other an
anomalies in areas with deep muck. Unfortunately, none archaeological site, are representative of the mid- to late-
of these appeared to be the gold-filled cannon that lore nineteenth-century farms that line the road along the pen-
has it was stashed somewhere in Long Carrying Place. insula. The third farmstead is potentially more interesting
One of the prehistoric sites is likely the Northrop Site, because it is in association with the blacksmith shop and
a Middle Woodland Period group burial. The other prehis- haydock/barn complex. The blacksmith shop was erected
toric site consisted of a private collection accumulated by by an Abner Rodgers as early as 1840 and certainly prior to
the farmer who worked the adjacent lands. The site was 1864, when it appears on a map. Based on later descriptions
centralized near the head of the inlet and the density of the of the structure and its alterations, it is likely the structure
artifacts dropped off quickly on either side of the bay. Un- still standing near the head of the bay. East of the black-
fortunately, the collection has been lost so it is impossible smith shop is the standing Becker home, built in the mid-
to analyze the material, but it was likely associated with the nineteenth century and inhabited by Fred Bartell. Bartell
portage. The log cabin may have also been associated with was a cooper and boat builder, and conveniently operated
the portage; unfortunately it has also suffered from the rav- one of the two major haydocks on Point Peninsula (fig. 4).
ages of time. What remained of the cabin was burned dur- The cooper shop next to the house was torn down in 1953

30 The INA Annual 2007

Fig. 3. Lake Ontario Maritime Cultural Landscape Project survey areas, 2007 season: 1. Sherwin Bay 2. Long Carrying Place 3. Wilsons
Bay 4. Storrs Harbor.

www.inadiscover.com 31

Fig. 4. Haydock at Long Carrying Place
but the haydock is still intact. The remains of a sweep-
ing path approaches the haydock from the main road and
passes the foundation of the barn. The barn was built in
1885 based on a carved stone salvaged from the founda-
tion and presumably was used to store grain prior to be-
ing loaded onto the scows. The dock took advantage of the
protected nature of the inlet and the relatively deep water
near its center to load grain grown on the peninsula onto
scows for shipment to Oswego, Sackets Harbor, and Cape
Vincent. Bartell seems to have taken advantage of the loca-
tion of his home to expand his business from coopering to
boat building (working under the “if you can keep water in
a barrel you can keep water out of a boat” principle) and
built many of the scows used in this trade, in addition to
several fishing boats. The exact location of the boat build-
ing operation is unknown, but there is a graded area near
the haydock that appears to be the most obvious spot for
boat building. Thus, there was a small cluster of industrial
activities: blacksmith, cooper, and boat builder, around the
transportation node of the haydock. This cluster fulfilled
many of the needs of the farmers strung along the peninsula
between the towns of Three Mile Bay and Point Peninsula,
and formed one of the primary links between the terrestrial
agrarian system and the maritime transportation system.
It is also worth noting the coincidence of two differ-
ent forms of transportation, historic and prehistoric, in this
small bay. Native Americans and European Americans may
have selected this spot for different reasons, but both groups
32
likely benefited from the protection offered
by the bay, although this may have been less
of a concern for boats to be portaged with
their paddlers. The visibility of the spot may
have also been a consideration. The deep cut
of the narrow bay, with its high bluff to the
east, is easily identified from the water and
may have made it a convenient location to
begin a portage because it allowed each trek
to begin from the same location reducing the
chances of wandering off track. Similarly, the
haydock may have been difficult to see, but
its geographic setting would have permitted
boatmen to easily navigate to it. This overlap-
ping of historic and prehistoric sites along
the shore is not uncommon, as suggested by
the Storrs Harbor (see below) survey area.
Wilsons Bay
The Wilsons Bay survey area (fig.
3, number 3) was similar to Sherwin Bay in that its bot-
tom was flat rock and there were large boulders piled
around the margin attesting to the power of winter ice.
This area yielded two nineteenth-century agricultural
sites as well as a second haydock. This haydock was likely
used to export grain to Sackets Harbor, situated imme-
diately to the south. It was also purportedly used by rum
runners during Prohibition because it was one of the last
locations where illegal alcohol from Canada could be off-
loaded before passing the authorities as Sackets Harbor.
Storrs Harbor
Storrs Harbor (fig. 3, number 4) is situated just up
the Black River from Sackets Harbor and much of its sig-
nificance is due to its association with the American naval
efforts at Sackets during the War of 1812. In early 1815 the
approximately 2800-ton Chippewa was partially built on
the site, sister ship to the more famous New Orleans, which
was mostly completed at Sackets Harbor. Neither ship was
finished due to the end of the war and the Rush-Bagot
Treaty, and Chippewa was either dismantled or burned in
the 1830s. The site of the shipyard structures, including a
blacksmith shop and barracks, is currently being excavated
by the Jefferson County Historical Society. Very little, if
any, evidence of the ship shed and launching ways are extant
above the shallow bedrock where the ship was built. Beyond
the brief but intense spate of activity in 1815, historic maps
indicate that Storrs Harbor was not intensively inhabited.
The INA Annual 2007
 The survey of this area, however, identified eight lunge Bay just beyond the point. This landing place was
sites besides the shipyard, as well as several isolated finds excavated by soldiers from Madison Barracks at the turn
which included several unidentified pieces of iron, dis- of the twentieth century and was used for landing barges
articulated wooden fragments, as well as an ice spud, and for bringing caissons onto Storrs Point over the ice.
a wrought iron mooring anchor, wooden dock frag- According to informants, soldiers and cannons were regu-
ments, what appears to be a boiler, and a ground-stone larly sent to Storrs Point by barge or over winter ice and
adze. The identified sites included at least two prehis- then made to march the 2.5 miles (six kilometers) back to
toric sites as well as historic sites dating from just after the barracks. Other elderly informants reported recover-
the War of 1812 through the early twentieth century. ing large amounts of lead shot from two areas of the shore
A Middle Woodland Period site, identified by di- immediately west of the survey area. This shot was appar-
agnostic ceramics, is situated within the bounds of the ently deposited by soldiers from the ice, using the cliff
War of 1812 shipyard. A second site or
sites, known only from private collec-
tions was situated along the hillside
to the east. Artifacts from these sites
suggest Middle and Late Archaic oc-
cupations, as well Middle Woodland
occupations and included a net weight.
The mid-nineteenth century Euro-
American occupation of the area was
represented by the associated remains
of a farmhouse, barn, and ice house. The
farm house was built ca. 1840 and torn
down during the 1970s or 1980s. It ex-
ists today as a well-laid stone foundation
with internal cistern. The barn associat-
ed with the house was converted to a liv-
ing space and is inhabited by the current
property owner. West of the barn and
house, on property that was originally as- Fig. 5. Side-scan sonar records of the dock cribbing (left) and ballast pile (right) situated
sociated with the farm, are the remains of within the Storrs Harbor survey area
an ice house. Very little of the structure
remains but the access ramp, cut into the
steep cliff side, is still visible. The icehouse was in opera- face as a convenient backstop for winter target practice.
tion until the advent of electrical refrigeration and was one Two other sites in the Storrs Harbor area are more dif-
of the sources of ice for the Sackets Harbor area. Much of ficult to date. A 1.2-by-1.5-meter stone-filled wooden crib
the forests of Storrs Point are cut through with stone walls (fig. 5) was situated approximately 40 meters offshore, 100
and abandoned track ways, suggesting its agrarian past. meters west of the 1812 shipyard site. It was constructed of
The Storrs Harbor area was also used by the US Army 8–13-centimeter-thick rectangular timbers and protrudes
during the late nineteenth century. Situated on top of the only slightly beyond the sediment. This cribbing is not as-
hill are the earth and stone backstops for a firing range, sociated with any modern or historic structures and may be
used for rifle practice by troops stationed at Madison Bar- associated with the shipyard. However, ice in this region
racks in Sackets Harbor during 1894. The range had a can be devastating, and, despite being intact, the cribbing
very short life because it was deemed unsafe shortly after may have been moved from elsewhere. More likely in situ is
completion. (Apparently, fishermen utilizing Muskellunge the possible ballast pile located in the northeast corner of
Bay did not like that any errant bullets would almost cer- the survey area. This lozenge-shaped pile of is oriented NE/
tainly land in the bay.) Likely associated with the firing SW and measures 10.7 meters long and approximately 4.6
range is a graded landing place along the shore of Muskel- meters wide. The majority of the stones in the pile were flat,

www.inadiscover.com 33
measuring 60 centimeters in diameter and 1.3-4 centimeters
thick. If the pile is in fact ballast, it is not likely a shipwreck,
rather it may be from a vessel preparing to take on cargo in
Sackets Harbor, or possible one that found itself ground-
ed in the shallow water at the mouth of Muskellunge Bay.
A more likely candidate for a shipwreck was the
series of magnetic anomalies that were recorded in the
sandy shallows not far from the ballast pile. An 1829 chart
indicates a nearby location as the wreck of a gunboat. The
wreck occurred when one of the 15 75-foot gunboats (built
during the final push of 1815) that were moored at Storrs
Harbor broke free in a storm and became lodged on a
sandbar. While it is difficult to match the historic chart to
the modern landscape
because it contains few
hard points and the
shoreline has changed
dramatically over the
last 180 years, the co-
incidence of several
magnetic anomalies
spanning several sur-
vey lines to form a lin-
ear pattern in an area
that is likely to contain Fig. 6. Lake Ontario Maritime Cultural Landscape Project survey areas, 2008 season Thus, the history of
a wreck is heartening.
The Storrs Har-
bor area can be interpreted from a number of vantages,
including the repeated interface between land and water
in military service at the beginning and end of the nine-
teenth century as well as the use of the shoreline for ag-
ricultural industries such as ice harvesting. The area also
lends itself to some interesting preliminary conclusions
regarding Native American use of the shore. At both
Long Carrying Place and Storrs Harbor there is evidence
of repeated pre-Contact Native American habitation
in specific locations along the water’s edge. In the case
of Middle Woodland peoples, there is some suggestion
that the preference was for high ground overlooking the
water. This information is even more striking when the
material record of these two narrow inlets is compared
with the broader rock bays that typified Sherwin and Wil-
sons Bays. At these locations there was comparatively
little prehistoric material. Thus, it seems that Native
Americans had a preference for narrow inlets, possibly as
they offered good opportunities to seine for fish as sug-
gested by the net weight recovered from Storrs Harbor.
34
Conclusion
The Lake Ontario Maritime Cultural Landscape
Project is ongoing and the 2008 season will be completed
between May and July. Three additional survey areas, span-
ning the international border and including the important
Revolutionary War site of Carleton Island will be complet-
ed during that time (fig. 6). The combined results of the
seven surveys will be analyzed to address how people used
the shore landscape and how those changes shifted with
time, technology, and culture. Any reading of Lake Ontar-
io’s history is filled with individuals that made their living
on both sides of the waterline. Barzillai Pease, who was a
pilot on the Hudson River for Robert Fulton and operated
the early steamboat
Ontario on Lake
Ontario, but also
made his living as
a land-based mer-
chant and farmer,
is an example. Fred
Bartell, the cooper
and boat builder
of Long Carrying
Place, is another.
the shore is seam-
less, with humans
moving easily from water to land, utilizing resources
throughout; archaeological investigations and inter-
pretations should likewise be seamless. Ultimately, it is
the goal of this project to contribute to this integrated
and more holistic approach to maritime archaeology.
Additional information regarding the 2007 sea-
son, as well as updates on the 2008 season are avail-
able through a web journal hosted by the Museum of
Underwater Archaeology (www.uri.edu/mua/).◆
Acknowledgments
This project would not have been possible with-
out the generous support of INA and the unflagging
endurance of several current and former Nautical Ar-
chaeology Program students. A complete list of sup-
porters and volunteers is available on the Museum
of Underwater Archaeology website, but Drs. Kevin
Crisman and Donny Hamilton deserve special recog-
nition for their support of this research, as does direc-
tor John DeLapa for helping to fund the 2007 season.
The INA Annual 2007
 THE FRIGATE ERTUĞRUL
The 2007 Underwater Survey off Oshima Island, Japan
Berta LLedÓ and Cemal PULAK with contributions by Kazuhiro Hantani and Selçuk Kolay

While the work of the Institute of Nautical Archaeology in
Turkey is well-established—Uluburun, Yassıada, and Serçe
Limanı are among its most famous excavations and INA’s
Research Center in Bodrum has served as the administrative
center for an even wider-ranging list of archaeological work
that continues to contribute to the institute’s success—it
may come as some surprise to the reader that up until re-
cently, INA had never excavated a shipwreck directly relat-
ed to the modern history of Turkey. Furthermore, when it
did so, it took place at a site off the eastern shores of Japan.
more personal artifacts involved would spark public and of-
ficial interest not only in the project but in INA in general.
After considerable planning, in January 2007 an in-
ternational team led by INA Turkey, with Tufan Turanlı
as director/coordinator and INA vice president and Texas
A&M Nautical Archaeology Program professor Cemal
Pulak as archaeological director, went to the area of the
shipwreck to conduct a thorough sonar, magnetometer,
and visual underwater survey that prepared the team for
the forthcoming years of excavation and conservation.

Fig. 1. The Ertuğrul in Istanbul Harbor in an undated photo (All images in this article courtesy Ertuğrul Project archive (Randal Sasaki,
Tufan Turanlı, Yasar Anter, M. Akagi and Idil Resa)

In 2004, INA Bodrum Research Facility administrator
Tufan Turanlı decided to investigate firsthand the remains
of an Ottoman frigate, tragically sunk in a storm while re-
turning from Japan in 1890 and salvaged piecemeal in the
years shortly thereafter. While the devastating nature of
the vessel’s sinking, as well as the history of typhoons in the
region, did not offer up much promise of finding hull re-
mains, it was believed that the interesting stories and other,
The Ertuğrul: Historical Background, Voyage and
Tragedy
The frigate Ertuğrul was a wooden, full-rigged
ship ordered built by the Ottoman Sultan Abdülmecid
I in 1854 in Istanbul’s Taşkızak shipyard and launched
in 1864. Shortly afterward she sailed to England to be
equipped with electrical lighting and outfitted with ma-
chinery and boilers. On January 18, 1865, the Ertuğrul

www.inadiscover.com 35
left Portsmouth, visiting several Spanish and French ing in strength until at some point the sails had to be
harbors on the long return trip to Istanbul and, in furled. The frigate could hardly advance. The 40-meter
1866, taking part in the Ottoman Cretan Campaign. (130-foot) high mizzen mast collapsed and caused se-
Upon its arrival in its home port vere damage by knocking
the frigate fell into a period of from side to side and bang-
disuse. In 1889, however, after ing into the other sails. The
Technical details of Ertuğrul:
long and considerable assess- severity of the storm caused
Tons burden: 2,344 tons
ment, the 25-year-old Ertuğrul the deck planking at the bow
Length: 79 m (260 ft)
was chosen for a noble mission: to loosen, allowing water to
Beam: 15.5 m (51 ft)
a diplomatic trip to Japan. The seep into the coal bunkers
Draft: 8 m (26 ft)
mission was a visit to Emperor in the boiler room. The crew
Depth of hold: 25.6 m (84 ft)
Meiji in return for the 1887 fruitlessly tried to repair the
Propulsion: two horizontal engines of 600 hp
visit to Istanbul of his nephew deck while simultaneously
Prince Komatsu and his wife. bailing out the coal bunkers
Armament:
In order to prepare her for by hand, since the mechani-
8x 15 cm Krupp guns
the long (approximately 9,500- cal pumps were insufficient.
5x 150 lb (68 kg) Armstrong guns
nautical-mile) journey, the frig- Despite all efforts, the
2x 4, 2x 3 font Krupp guns
ate was taken to the shipyard in situation was unsustain-
2x 5-barreled Hotchkiss guns
Istanbul for the necessary hull able and the only option was
2x 5-barreled, 4x5-barreled Nordenfeld guns
maintenance work, although to reach a nearby port. The
1x 12-lb and 1x 6-lb rocket launcher
nothing was done on the ma- Ertuğrul was pointed toward
1x torpedo launcher
chinery installed in England 24 Kobe, only 10 miles away, in
2x torpedoes
years earlier. In July 1889, the the gulf beyond Cape Kashi-
100x Martini-Henry rifles
Ertuğrul, with Admiral Ali Os- nozaki with the Oshima Light-
100x Winchester rifles
man Pasa serving not only as the house. The seawater break-
40x pistols
commander of the ship but also ing through the deck finally
as the sultan’s diplomatic en- extinguished one of the fur-
voy, began her journey to Japan. naces in the engine room. Al-
The voyage was not easy. Besides the requested most immobile without her main sails and suffi-
courtesy and diplomatic stops in friendly countries, the cient propulsion, the Ertuğrul drifted towards the
old frigate had many hull and maintenance problems dangerous rocks on the eastern coast of Oshima Island.
along the way that had to be solved. The first occurred The crew tried to stop the frigate with emergency
within a month of departure, when the Ertuğrul entered anchors before it hit the reef, but they were too late.
the Suez Canal and ran ashore in Great Bitter Lake, dam- The 76-meter ship, according to survivors, split in half
aging the stern post and rudder in the process. It took and sank. Of more than 600 sailors, 533 died that day.
almost two months repair the damage, and she set sail Sixty-nine survivors managed to reach the shore near
again on September 23rd. In western Indian Ocean, the Kashinozaki and climbed up a steep and rocky cliff to
ship took on water from the bow. The necessary repairs the lighthouse. The accident was then reported and
had to wait until arrival in the port of Singapore, from the entire village of Kashino on Oshima island worked
which Ertuğrul and her crew departed on March 22, 1890. on rescuing and caring for survivors of the accident.
On June 7, 1890, at the end of 11 months at sea, The exact time and date of the collision is still under
the frigate finally arrived in Yokohama, Japan. After a discussion since there are certain discrepancies between
very successful three months in the island nation, at- Turkish and Japanese sources. It seems that the frigate
tending official events and meeting the Emperor Meiji, reached her fatal destination at approximately 9:00 p.m.,
the Turkish dignitaries and crew of the Ertuğrul start- September 16th, 1890. Nevertheless, some sources de-
ed their way back to Turkey on September 15, 1890. scribe the incident as a two-day-long fight against the storm
According to recollections of the survivors, shortly that ended around midnight on September 18th, 1890.
after their departure a reverse wind began to blow, gain- At that time, there were about 50 households in

36 The INA Annual 2007

Kashino. The inhabitants all lived in poverty, a poverty salvaged by Japanese divers and returned to Istanbul. The
increased just then by poor luck in fishing due to the bad large guns were apparently used later on another Turkish
weather. Nevertheless, the local people offered everything frigate built at Taşkızak, the Orhaniye. The ship’s boilers,
they had to those who survived the wreck of the Ertuğrul, screw, and other large parts were probably salvaged the
a ship from an entirely unfamiliar country, Turkey. year following the ship’s sinking and sold off by the Japa-
When the news reached Tokyo, Emperor Meiji sent nese salver/divers for scrap metal to pay for the salvage
medical help to the village
and shortly thereafter, on
the 20th of September,
the survivors were sent to
a hospital in Kobe for their
final recovery. On the 5th
of October, by Imperial or-
der, two Japanese warships,
Hiei and Kongou, were as-
signed to take the Ertuğrul
survivors back to Turkey.
Condolence money was col-
lected from all over Japan
and delivered to the fami-
lies of the accident victims.
This unfortunate event
remains to this day the big-
gest naval disaster in Turk-
ish history, and its circum-
stances cemented the long
and enduring friendship
between the modern na-
tions of Japan and Turkey.

The 2007 Ertuğrul Survey

The purpose of the 2007
survey at Oshima Island, Ja-
pan, was to determine the Fig. 2. Map indicating general location of Ertuğrul, which sank after hitting a reef off of Cape Kashi-
importance of the Ertuğrul’s nozaki on the eastern coast of Oshima Island, soon after leaving a three-month diplomatic mission to
remains and to ascertain Yokohama
the area of the wreckage.
It was known that
there was little possibility of finding any consider- operation. Nevertheless, it was anticipated that some large
able remains of the Ertuğrul’s hull in its original shape metal parts were still at the bottom of the sea, as well as most
due to the manner in which the frigate sank as well as of the smaller machinery components and personal effects.
the hydrographic and meteorological nature of area, Between the 6th and 25th of January 2007 three
which has been hit by many typhoons since 1890. teams worked on the Ertuğrul site, some of them simul-
Nevertheless, the Ertuğrul was a massive wooden taneously. One of the most important research compo-
steamship, a navy frigate with three masts and sail, cannons nents was a multi beam sonar survey conducted from Janu-
and armor. It is known that the cannons were salvaged in ary 9–11 to cover the sea bottom systematically near the
the Meiji Era, and it now appears that much of the ships us- well-known wreckage area to learn if there were any large
able hardware, guns, and some personal possessions were parts of the ship remaining, and to collect precise infor-

www.inadiscover.com 37
mation on the seabed topographies and on the condition ters and in some occasions we had to suspend the sur-
of scattered remnants at the point where the ship sank. vey due to boat and equipment safety considerations.
To obtain such vital information, we used RESON The real-time sonar data were difficult to inter-
Inc.’s SeaBat8125 High Resolution Multi beam Echo Sound- pret. A few targets were detected in the sand area off the
er. The sonar operating frequency was 455kHz, and beam- coast, but it was impossible to distinguish them from
forming echoed into 240 of 1/2-degree beams up to a 120- rock formations without post-processing the obtained
meter range, achieving nearly a 6mm sampling resolution. data A bathymetry chart of the entire survey area was cre-
For positioning and motion/heading compensa- ated by post-processing the Multi beam Survey data with
tion, a GPS-aided Inertial Navigation System and a POS the HYPACK MAX Hydrographic Survey/Processing
MV WaveMaster were used. The system was installed Software and Fledermaus 3-D Visualization Software.
on a six-ton fishing boat, and the sonar head of the Sea- We were unable to find any of the remains of the
Bat8125 was firmly over-side-mounted on the ship. Dis- Ertuğrul in the multi beam survey. While the results could
have been discouraging,
they were in fact quite re-
assuring. The fact that no
remains were found in the
deeper waters around the
wreck confirms the survi-
vors’ recollections of the
accident. The Ertuğrul
sank shortly after hitting
the reef and went directly
to the bottom of the sea,
particularly the ship’s
heaviest parts, which were
not salvaged and will re-
main in this area when
the excavation starts.
Following the multi
beam sonar survey results,
we were quite sure that
no major visible remains
from Ertuğrul were pres-
ent on the sea bed sur-
rounding the area where
the ship went down.
Fig. 3. Multibeam echo sounding GPS, and WaveMaster systems were mounted in the stern of the survey To make sure that no
boat to enable real-time monitoring of the seabed. The Oshima Lighthouse is visible on Cape Kashinozaki
such parts were buried in
in the background.
the mud/silt or sandy bot-
tom which could not be
plays were installed ion the rear of the deck to allow us detected by sonar waves (acoustically), however, a magne-
to monitor the ocean floor and large remains in real time. tometer survey was also completed in the surroundings of
The multi beam survey was conducted in a the main diving area thanks to OYO Corporation, which
shore-side area of about one kilometer southwest sent a team of technicians with the necessary equipment.
and 500 meters northeast from the shipwreck spot. From January 13–15, the area previously surveyed by
The bottom topography in this area was more the multi beam sonar was divided in two sectors, which
complicated than we had expected; the depth sud- were each scanned by a Geometrics cesium marine mag-
denly changed from a few dozen meters to a few me- netometer with an accuracy of 0.01 nano Tesla. Both sec-

38 The INA Annual 2007

tors were scanned by pulling paral-
lel lines (50 meters apart from each
other) to the shore. Again, this sur-
vey revealed no magnetic anomaly
which could lead back to any bur-
ied metal remains from the wreck.
The reef area where the high-
est concentration of artifacts is
found has been visited officially on
different occasions: in the 1980s
a local diving team recovered few
well-preserved artifacts for the lo-
cal museum; in 1990 a team from
the Turkish Navy explored the site
in the centennial celebration of the
tragedy; in 2004 INA’s Turanlı
assessed the site for possible ar-
chaeological survey and excavation.
The scattered remains are
found in an area of roughly one
square kilometer near the local
lighthouse, and features a very Figs. 4. and 5. The main concentration of artifacts is in an area 13
rocky shore with many rocks at sea level. The diving took meters deep. Sea action and currents are very strong in the area,
place in this area to make a visual reconnaissance and a as the photograph, above, demonstrates. Remains of a lantern
realistic assessment of the site for future excavation. and a pipe fitting can be seen in the foreground; part of a Win-
The main concentration of personal effects and ship’s chester rifle concreted to the sea bed, below. Many of the 200 rifles
debris can be found in an underwater valley of roughly 70 on board were salvaged shortly after the accident and returned
by 15 meters flanked by high rocks at a maximum depth of to Istanbul.
17 meters. The rough seas and long history of typhoons and
storms have added more than 30 large boulders on top of
Ertuğrul’s remains; they were all mapped and measured to
estimate their weight and the possibility of their removal.
Most of the area was also investigated by metal de-
tector. Many parts of the site registered higher frequen-
cy, indicating a high concentration of artifacts, espe-
cially in the north end of the valley where a large cooking
pot and other artifacts were visible on the sea bottom.
A total of eleven artifacts were raised during
the 2007 survey and given to the Kushimoto Turk-
ish museum. Permission was granted by the Japanese
authorities to temporarily take four of the artifacts Ertuğrul. The other sample was taken from one of the arti-
to Turkey to complete their conservation process. facts, a block sheave, and was identified as Lignum vitae, a
Two wood samples were also taken by Cemal Pulak hard tropical wood commonly used for this type of pieces
to be analyzed and to determine the type of wood used in since it endures well the humid marine environment.
the hull. The samples were sent to Nili Liphschitz of Tel Once in INA’s Bodrum laboratory, conservators made
Aviv University. A wood fragment that seemed to be part an assessment of their preservation and completely desali-
of the hull was identified as Quercus cerris (Turkey Oak), nated them. They were cleaned and treated and then returned
which confirms that the surveyed remains indeed belong to to the Kushimoto Museum for display in January 2008.

www.inadiscover.com 39
Fig. 6. Recovered artifacts: ERT 001: probable lantern remains; ERT 002: hinge; ERT 003: iron-wood sheave with copper alloy center
piece; ERT 0004: bayonet handle; ERT 0005: pipe; ERT 0006: copper alloy sheave; ERT 0007: faucet; ERT 0008: bracket; ERT 0011:
ammo shell bearing the star and the moon, symbol of the Turkish army.

In days in which the wind was too strong to allow div-
ing, the team collected local information about the wreck-
age from archives. In the days after the accident, local of-
ficials had recorded all the details of the events and of the
rescue efforts by the local fisherman. There is a day-by-day
account with locations of all remains and bodies found on
the nearby beaches. Several documents were translated by
Randall Sasaki, a graduate student in the Nautical Archae-
ology Program at Texas A&M University. Survey members
also recorded several interviews with old women from the
Kashino village whose fathers were young fishermen in
1890, and who could still recall the stories that their fa-
thers used to tell them about the tragedy of the Ertuğrul.
Our Japanese Colleagues: Official Relations and Con-
tributions
Official relations play an important role in any exca-
vation and research procedure, especially when working
in foreign countries. In the Ertuğrul Project case, official
relations could not have been better. The municipality of
Kushimoto and the governor’s office of Wakayama, the
prefecture in which Oshima Island is situated, were ex-
tremely happy with the presence of the Turkish team and
gave all the logistic support that was requested from them.
At the end of our survey the municipality of Kushi-
moto donated the use of a large building—the former
primary school of Kashino—as a conservation labora-
tory and research offices for the team in the forthcom-
ing years. The Kashino fishing cooperative also of-
fered the use of its harbor facilities to the project.
During the three weeks’ duration of the survey a great
deal of interest was generated in the Japanese press, includ-
ing full-page articles and personal interviews with various
team members. A total of more than 52 articles in the coun-

40 The INA Annual 2007

try’s top newspapers were published and all of the main TV
stations (NHK, TV Wakayama, Kansai TV, Asahi TV and
Mainchi TV) came to cover the project’s press conferenc-
es, as well as air special interviews and programs about the
project. The coverage in the Turkish press was also good
with an average of three minutes of news every day at the end
of the news program on the Turkish Television channel.
We could personally experience the effective-
ness of the press on the Japanese public since every-
one coming to stay in our hotel from other parts of
Japan knew who we were and what we were doing.
In Turkey the effect of the project on official relations
has been very positive, having fed and renewed INA rela-
tions with the Turkish Navy and Coast Guard Forces— both
key authorities for INA marine operations. The popularity
of the everyday news about the project has help enormously
to create general public interest in INA and its projects.◆
Acknowledgments
We were thrilled to have some guests of honor in
Kushimoto, Japan like George and Ann Bass, Claude
and Barbara Duthuit, and Donny Hamilton. Their pres-
ence gave great support to the project and generated a
series of news articles about the history of underwater
archaeology. They regularly joined the team on the boat
and Mr. Duthuit participated in the underwater work.
Our team would like to thank the organiza-
tions that made the Ertuğrul Project possible, espe-
cially, YapiKredi Emeklilik, the Turkish insurance
company that completely financed the Ertuğrul Proj-
ect; Turkish Airlines, for contributing all transpor-
tation expenses; and INA for providing equipment
as well as Tufan Turanlı’s and Cemal Pulak’s time.
We would also like to give special thanks to Kushi-
moto’s Municipality for its unconditional support.

2007 Ertuğrul Project team members, from left: Idil Ece Resa, Toshihisa Shirotsubaki, Hiroshi Enomoto, Selçuk Kolay, Randall J. Sasaki,
Yoshiko Nakamura, Tufan Turanlı, Masakazu Akagi, Cemal Pulak, and Toshiyuki Shimano (in drysuit, far right). Not pictured:Claude
Duthuit, Kazuhiro Hantani, Shunichi Fujishima and Akira Yoshizawa from RESON, Toyo Corporation, and Yoshinori Matsumoto
and Yusuke Sugimoto from Windy Network; Sato Yoshibumi from Oyo Corporation and Isao Oogane from Ocean Engineering Corpo-
ration; Donny Hamilton and George F. Bass, advisers; Onur Küçükarslan, media manager; Keiichiro Kondo, general assistant, Japan
NHK television; and Yaşar Anter, Doğan news agency.

www.inadiscover.com 41
SEEKING EARLY BRONZE-AGE TRADE MARINERS

Underwater at Tell Fadous-Kfarabida, Lebanon

Ralph K. PEDERSEN

Dazzling sunlight poured through the crystal clear materials relating to the tell; to ascertain if there were
waters of the Mediterranean, illuminating the seafloor and indications of harbor works or a harborage associated with
the thousands of silvery fish the site; and to discover
circling me. It was a far cry whether shipwrecks of any
from the past several days of period lay off the shore
diving in rough, wind-tossed of Fadous-Kfarabida.
seas that at times threatened
to curtail our survey, if not Geophysical Setting
break some bones. On land, The shore in the
a team of archaeologists from area of the tell is a mix
the American University of large rock formations
of Beirut (AUB) excavated interspersed with pebble
a nearby settlement nearly and cobble beaches. A
5,000 years old. While the series of rock outcrops jut
land archaeologists labored into the sea beginning in
under the hot August sun, our front of the tell and continue
job was to explore the sea. All north to the small harbor
this while not far to the north of Fadous. South of the
the Lebanese army battled tell, the shoreline consists
Al-Qaeda-style extremists in of a long cobble beach
Nahr el-Bared, the Palestinian interrupted a kilometer or
refugee camp outside Tripoli. so to the south by a rock
Helicopter gunships regularly formation several meters
flew overhead, ferrying high. The entire seafront
arms and the wounded as is a lee shore regularly
a nation held its breath, beaten by westerly winds
shaking its head in despair and waves, abating to
and unbelief, and yearning short periods of calm.
for a chance to just live. Such The winds and waves
is archaeology in Lebanon. create a strong underwater
As part of AUB’s surge, pulsing into the
archaeological project at the shore and then pulling out.
Early Bronze Age Tell Fadous- This high energy action
Kfarabida, in August 2007 has undoubtedly eroded
I conducted an underwater the shoreline over the
archaeological survey of the Fig. 1. Pedersen enters the southeast corner of Tell Bay, where the millennia, particularly in
shallow coastal areas related to beach slopes gently into the sea. Tell Bay may be the part of the those areas not benefiting
the site. My survey goals were seafront mostlikely utilized by the inhabitants of the Tell Fadous- from the protection of the
to determine whether there Kfarabida for their fishing and other maritime activities (photo by rock outcrops. The wave
were subaquatic archaeological Erik A. Pedersen). effect is present even at

42 The INA Annual 2007

Figs. 2 and 3. Tell Fadous-Kfarabida (above) dates to approximately 2900 to 2600 B.C. The excavation, under the direction of AUB
professors Helen Sader and Hermann Genz, is essentially a rescue excavation as a large section of the tell was dug out in recent years for
material to make cement; a view of the southern bay and cobble beach (below); to the right of center is Tell Fadous-Kfarabida (photos by
Ralph Pedersen)

www.inadiscover.com 43
depths of five to six meters some 30 to 40 meters from
shore. As a result, little sand accumulates in the area
except in zones protected by geological formations
or by the collapsed seaward faces of the surface rock
formations. Some gravel is present in the lee areas of
the rock outcrops, but its presence and dispersal is not
uniform. The gravel consists of well-rounded pebbles that
indicates their erosion due to the sea action over the eons.
Further out, perhaps some ten to twenty meters
beyond the edge of the rock buttresses, increasing bottom
depth lessens the surge of the sea to almost nothing although
severe winter storms probably disturb these depths. In
this zone the sea acquires a stark beauty and large swaths
of sand appear, accumulating in broad depressions in the
bedrock that run roughly parallel to the shore. Beyond
this, large areas of bedrock covered with vegetation
and other rock-clinging organisms predominate. The
seascape is broken, fractured by canyons and fissures
whose bottoms are covered with loose sand but little else.

Methodology
The survey area was divided into five sectors. Three
of these comprised small natural bays: one directly in
front of the tell (“Tell Bay”), the second at the mouth
of the wadi north of the tell (“Wadi Bay”), and the last
fronting the Hotel Dorada in the northern part of our
survey area (“Hotel Bay”). The fourth area was the
large open bay to the south of Tell Bay. The fifth area
was the open sea west of the bays to approximately 300
meters from shore where the depth reached 18 meters.
The areas, particularly the bays and the open western
area, were surveyed utilizing a standard “search and
recovery” pattern, in which each zone was traveled from
end to end while examining the sea floor and geological
features. The large open bay to the south was cursorily
explored as vision was limited, with blind conditions in the
zone nearest the tell. This curtailed survey efforts there as
there was little sense to swimming blindly in rolling surf.

Survey Observations
As the shorefront at Tell Fadous-Kfarabida is
a high-energy zone, pre-survey analysis indicated
that artifact preservation there would be poor. With

Figs. 4 and 5. A map of Lebanon (above) showing the location

of the tell in relation to Beirut and Tripoli; the coast in the vicin-
ity of Tell Fadous-Kfarabida (below) showing the designated
survey areas (maps by Ralph Pedersen)

44 The INA Annual 2007

prevailing waves pushing in from the west, almost all
of Hotel Bay and Wadi Bay are exposed to waves. The
bottoms in each of these bays are scoured to bare bedrock,
with a few pockets of gravel, pebbles and cobbles. Rolling
stones pushed back and forth by the sea have carved gullies
and cavities into the bedrock, attesting to the energy of
the sea and to the long-term duration of its erosive action.
Entering Hotel and Wadi Bays required either descent
in full scuba gear by ladder or a walking entrance which
entailed picking our way over boulders; exiting meant
clawing our way up a cobble-strewn slope on hands and
knees while battling the force and suction of the waves.
The southern edges of each bay are in the lee of the
rocks separating the bays from one another. Along these
edges there is less wave action and these calmer areas were
specifically targeted for survey. We also examined each bay
for easy access points that may have been utilized by the
ancient inhabitants of the area. Neither Wadi Bay nor Hotel
Bay was easily accessible to the team and it is assumed similar
conditions existed in antiquity due to the high rock faces.
Tell Bay, while subject to the same wave action
affecting the other bays, contains areas of sand deposits,
plant life, as well as fish and octopus gardens. Large rocks
on the southern edge of the bay provide a semi-protected
area blocking waves as well as wind. Abundant underwater
springs create pools of fresh water on the surface as well
Fig. 6. A view of the survey area looking south over Hotel Bay in the foreground, followed by Wadi Bay, Tell Bay, and in the back the
southern bay (photo by Ralph Pedersen)
www.inadiscover.com
as in subsurface areas during periods of calm, and it was
actually possible to remove one’s regulator and take a drink
under the sea! The northern extremity of Tell Bay is more
barren of marine life, as it is more exposed and scoured by
the waves and rolling cobbles. On the bay’s southeast corner
the beach slopes gently into the sea providing an easy entry
point, which makes Tell Bay the most useful nexus between
sea and land in the area. The abundance of fresh water and
fishes make it an attractive place for fishermen and this area
is the closest protected access to the tell. We believe this
is the part of the seafront most probably utilized by the
ancient nhabitants of the tell for their fishing and other
maritime activities. Indeed, one artifact was found in Tell
Bay near the access point—a stone knife blade, possibly
dating to the Neolithic period—indicates a long-term use
of the area and underscores its usefulness in antiquity.
Along the edges of the rocky peninsulas, the sea
becomes suddenly deeper, reaching to 4–6 meters,
probably due to scouring of the sea over the ages. On their
seaward faces, the sea becomes deeper still, reaching to
eight meters. Here modern trash accumulates, washed
down from the shallow areas of the bays. Bottles, cans,
fishing gear, and tires litter the sea floor in places. Some
broken pieces of modern pottery were found, as well as
floor tiles from the construction of the nearby buildings,
but no ancient artifacts were found around the rocks. Large
45
Fig. 7. A view of Wadi Bay, demonstrating the typical high rock walls along much of the shoreline (photo by Ralph Pedersen)
boulders also abound, apparently broken off the larger
rocks that comprise the peninsulas, smashed by waves
over the years until fissuring occurred. Channels and pits
carved into the sea floor occur here as well, testifying to
the force of sea storms even at these, and greater, depths.
At about 200 meters from shore, in a depth of 10
meters or so, there is a long shelf facing landward. This
feature protrudes above the sea floor 1–2 meters and
lies roughly on a north-south axis; at its base there is a
considerable deposit of sand. This shelf forms a natural
catchment for silt eroded from the land, scoured from
the bays, and drawn out to the deeper areas by the sea
currents. The sand deposit was a focus of exploration
for artifacts that might have made their way here from
shallower areas over the centuries. None were found, but
as modern garbage is tending to collect here, perhaps
the deeper sand hides older material. We had no way of
moving sand except for digging small test pits by hand.
Further out, at about 300 meters from shore, are the
modern fishing grounds. At 13–14 meters of depth this area
is regularly fished by boat and by divers armed with spear
guns. Much of the ancient material in this area would long
ago have been salvaged, either for use or as curiosities.
Nevertheless, the team found a small number of pottery
sherds over an area reaching from in front of Hotel Bay
and south for a five hundred meters or more. Many of
46
these sherds are small, encrusted with marine growth, and
probably survived only as they are of no intrinsic or aesthetic
value. Likewise, ancient anchors of stone, lead components,
or iron would have been easily salvaged. A number of
anchors, both stone and iron, were found, particularly
to the north of Hotel Bay, but these were all modern as
seen in the remains of synthetic ropes fastened to them.
Most of the pottery sherds appear to be Late
Roman. A few are heavily eroded and cannot be dated.
The most interesting piece was found far south in our
search area and is part of the neck, shoulder, and handle
of a small jug. The sherds do not, however, represent
shipwrecks but are probably jettison from fishing boats.
Pottery dropped and broken on boats was, and still is,
simply tossed overboard to remove it from the boat.
The finds indicate, however, that the modern fishing
grounds are the same as those used in ancient times.
Fishermen everywhere are often archaeologist’s best
source of information about the sea and shipwrecks, and
Lebanon is no exception. Local fishermen from Fadous
related a story about a shipwreck in the area that occurred
in the early 20th century. Pottery was brought up from
the wreck decades ago, but the ship’s large iron anchor
still rests on the sea floor where it was found 20 years ago.
Our attempt to locate this wreck site was unsuccessful,
but the story illustrates the ease with which artifacts and
The INA Annual 2007
shipwrecks can be retrieved from the sea by the fishermen.
Also, nearby in Batroun, an ancient Canaanite/Phoenician
city, a fisherman in showed us amphoras from two wrecks.
One of these jugs appears to be first-century Roman, while
the other appeared to be a type common in the early first
millennium B.C. Locations given for these wrecks were
vague as the fisherman wanted to protect his resource,
but as their positions were outside our search parameters,
no attempt was made to locate the
wrecks during the 2007 survey.
Conclusions
The areas along the coast
of the Tell at Fadous-Kfarabida
contained no archaeological
remains indicative of maritime
activities related to the settlement
on the tell. Examination of the shore,
however, illuminates the seashore geography as it
relates to the tell. The rock
faces lining Hotel Bay and Fig. 8. The stone knife blade (2.9 cm. long) found near the access point little reason for non-local
Wadi Bay clearly limit the in Tell Bay (photo by Ralph Pedersen)
use of these areas as landing
points for boats in any
period. The sheltered access point on the southern edge
of Tell Bay indicates that this would likely have been the
primary area in the early Bronze Age where tell inhabitants
would launch fishing boats and return with their catch, if
not actually export and import items on a small scale. The
discovery of the knife blade in the shallows of the access
point underscores the usefulness of this place for marine
activities, and supports our determination that this bay
is the most probable harborage and fishing zone for the
inhabitants of Fadous-Kfarabida at the time. Small boats
could easily have anchored here, if not have been drawn up on
the shore. The adjacent rocks form a overhang and a barrier
to the elements, creating a sheltered cove in which the boats
could have stayed with a measure of safety in normal weather.
Similarly, the shores of the southern bay (area IV)
could also have played a role in the marine aspect of the
tell. For periods when the sea is calm enough, small canoe-
like boats could have accessed the shore by simply running
onto it. Although no hulls from the early Bronze Age have
been found, simple dugouts and small planked boats could
easily have been beached and launched from such a shore.
There have been shoreline changes in the eastern
Mediterranean over the millennia. Recent studies indicate
that there were at least two major tectonic uplifts in Lebanon:
www.inadiscover.com
one approximately 3,000 years ago, and the other in the
sixth century A.D. These have apparently resulted in the
Early Bronze Age shoreline being at least a meter above the
present sea level; the last major uplift fourteen centuries
ago contributed 40–60 centimeters to the change.
Despite these uplifts, both the beach of area IV and the
access point of Tell Bay probably would have been just as
useful as under present conditions.
As the survey area lay inside
the supposed sailing routes
between the ancient cities of
Byblos and Batroun, there is a
likelihood that shipwrecks from
antiquity lay further out to sea
in areas outside our research
parameters. These areas should
be examined in the future, possibly
by multi-beam sonar. After the tell
was abandoned after the Early Bronze
Age, there would have been
boats to visit this section of
the coast. Therefore, except
for the rare foundering of a
vessel in a storm, as happened in the early twentieth century,
it is unlikely long-range ships of antiquity would have come
to grief in the shallows of Tell Fadous-Kfarabida. Any local
watercraft wrecked or abandoned in the area would have
been quickly and easily salvaged, leaving little or no trace.◆
Further Reading
Bass, G.F. 1972. The Earliest Seafarers in the
Mediterranean and the Near East, Bass, G.F. (ed.)
A History of Seafaring Based on Underwater
Archaeology, 12–36. New York: Walker and Company.
Casson, L. 1971. Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient
World. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Johnstone, P. 1980. The Sea-craft of
Prehistory. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Morhange, C., et al. 2006. ‘Late Holocene
relative sea-level changes in Lebanon, Eastern
Mediterranean’, Marine Geology 230: 99–114.
Pirazzoli, P.A. 1996. Sea-Level Changes: The Last
20,000 Years. Chicester, UK: John Wiley & Sons.
47
 YUKON RIVER SURVEY 2007

John Pollack and Robyn WOODWARD

The Yukon Territory is rich with history and sternwheel-
ers dating back 110 years to the Klondike Gold Rush. Ap-
proximately 290 of these vessels operated between the
mouth of the Yukon River near St. Michael Alaska, and
Whitehorse, some 3300 kilometers upstream. Today some
of these vessels remain as wrecks lying in the fast water of the
river, but many others were pulled out every fall to avoid ice
damage, and now sit abandoned in the forests along the river.
In 2005 John Pollack and Robyn Woodward orga-
nized a reconnaissance trip to the Thirty Mile section of
the Yukon River. The Thirty Mile flows north out of Lake
Laberge in a series of sharp, rocky meanders that claimed
over 35 vessels between 1898 and 1936. Two earlier projects
(Waddell, 1979; Easton 1986) worked sites to the south, yet
they did not visit the Thirty Mile because of its remoteness.
Our first trip north operated under a Class 1 permit

Fig. 1. A view of the Evelyn after the team hacked away surrounding vegetation (all images courtesy the authors)

48 The INA Annual 2007

and covered 235 kilometers of the river by canoe. We
visited and collected reconnaissance information from
the sternwheelers Casca 1, the Evelyn, and the Klondike,
as well as from two small gold dredges. Basic measure-
ments, maps and photographs are contained in Pol-
lack and Woodward (2006), and site inventory forms
were filed with the Archaeological Survey of Canada.
In 2006 Pollack returned for a second recon-
naissance trip with noted British Columbia historian
Robert Turner and ship restorer Ken Butler. They vis-
ited the West Dawson site and inspected seven large,
100-110 year-old vessels of varying design lying on
shore adjacent to the river. Additionally, low water al-
lowed them to locate the Gleaner at Carcross and the
Clara Monarch within the city limits of Whitehorse.
In the fall of 2006 the Yukon River Survey was
adopted by INA and Pollack joined the institute as a re-
search associate. A two-phase field effort was proposed
for July 2007. The first phase utilized EPICSCAN, an
expert LIDAR-scanning company from Oregon, to sur-
vey and document the construction and condition of the
1908 sternwheeler Evelyn on Shipyard Island. We then
planned for a partial staff change and a second team to
visit the West Dawson site. At this site we would per- Figs. 2 and 3. An aerial view of Shipyard Island in the Yukon River, be-
form the first survey of seven large sternwheelers, file tween Dawson City and Whitehorse; below, a map of the area
site inventory forms, and discuss next steps for this
complex site. Finally, if time allowed we would docu-
ment the tiller-and-rudder systems on the Evelyn, the
Tyrell, the Julia B., the Seattle No. 3, and the Schwatka.

Phase One: The LIDAR Project on the Evelyn

The sternwheeler Evelyn lies on Shipyard Island,
midstream in the Yukon River, approximately 90 kilome-
ters from a road. This small island served both as a repair
shipyard and a winter storage area. Typically the route
between Dawson City and Whitehorse did not open until
late May, when the last ice went out on Lake Laberge. The
river is open several weeks earlier, but Lake Laberge is
invariably the last obstacle to navigation. Hence Shipyard
Island was well-positioned to stage freight and ships high
on the river, where they could wait for the lake to open.
The Evelyn was abandoned on the island in the
early 1920s. Unverified information compiled by Af-
fleck (2000) notes the wooden-hulled sternwheeler
was constructed in 1908 at St. Michael by Bratnobar
for the Upper Tanana Trading Company, and initially
operated under U.S. registration. Displacement was
508 tons gross and 397 tons registered with a length

www.inadiscover.com 49
of 39.6 meters (exclusive of paddlewheel), a beam of 8.7
meters, and a hull depth of 1.3 meters. The high pressure
engines were built by the Clinton Novelty Iron Works
in Iowa, had a bore of 30 centimeters and a stroke of 137
centimeters, and delivered 9.6 nominal horsepower.
The ship was sold to the Northern Navigation Com-
pany and subsequently wrecked in the Tanana River. The
machinery was salvaged and taken to St. Michael where a
new hull was built. In 1913 the vessel was converted to Ca-
nadian registry and in 1919 ownership was acquired by the
British Yukon Navigation Co.. It was beached on Shipyard
Island, the engines and one boiler removed to the Str. Keno
Fig. 4. LIDAR image, starboard side, Evelyn
in 1922, and the registration was formally cancelled in 1931.
The Evelyn’s hull, main (or freight) and boiler decks
are largely intact. The mid- and aft portions of the upper
deck and wheelhouse superstructure, have collapsed. The
starboard boiler and stack remain in place along with minor
machinery including a hand-operated water feed pump. The
rudder-and-tiller assemblies are intact, and display a three-
rudder, manual overhead tiller system utilizing two sets of
gudgeons and rudder wells. The engines, the port boiler,
and the port stack have been removed, and the paddlewheel
axle lies nearby. Overall length of the massive axle is 802
centimeters with a diameter of 21 centimeters. The six-sided
shaft is joined by a single splice—possibly a repair. The shaft
runs through five cast iron hubs of 106 centimeters diameter,
and each hub tied together 13 wooden arms (e.g. spokes).
50
None of the arms, paddle buckets or iron circles remains.
Also present at the site are four windlasses and the ship-
yard ways along with the remains of a blacksmith shop and a
steam bending box. The vessel is blocked up well above the
high water, on the far side of the windlasses at the shipyard.
The hull of the Evelyn contains two stringers or
streaks supporting continuous diagonal trusses incorpo-
rating metal tie-rods. These truss assemblies are offset
2.5 meters from the keel. There is also a central keelson
with a solid bulkhead above it. This assembly rests on small
cross timbers. The hull is 1.4 meters deep to the bottom of
the bilge, and the chine displays cocked-hat construction.
Two lines of hog-posts (or braces) were used to support
a system of hog-chains and stiffen the hull, and support
both the machinery and the paddlewheel. Knuckle chains
also supported the sides of the vessel under the boilers.
In the beginning of July 2007, a five-person crew and
camp was transported to Shipyard Island by riverboat to
conduct a detailed LIDAR survey of the Evelyn. As a first
step, a half-day was spent cutting all brush and conifer-
ous regeneration from around the perimeter of the vessel
to provide clear lines of sight from the LIDAR stations.
The LIDAR survey was utilized a Leica Scansta-
tion powered by a battery and a Honda EU2000 inverter
generator. The LIDAR unit is a sophisticated, robotic
total station equipped with a pulse laser, and it is capa-
ble of collecting millions of data points per hour under
The INA Annual 2007
ideal conditions. Prism targets are not required
and the pulse laser permits the collection of data
from physically inaccessible areas. The resultant
individual data clouds obtained from each setup
point were merged into a single, 3D data cloud.
The Leica unit was owned and operated by
Carlos Velazquez and Doug Devine of EPICS-
CAN (Oregon), who participated in the project as
volunteers. In the course of five days, more than
46 LIDAR stations were established around, on,
and within the vessel. Stations were established
on the main and saloon decks, and in the bilges.
The general scanning parameters made a shot ev-
ery five millimeters at a distance of 15 meters, such
that over 160 million data points were collected.
While we would not have taken as many data points
with a conventional survey and a total station, had
we done so the collection of this much survey-
grade data would have required 1300 crew-years.
The result of this project may be the most
complete model of a vessel ever produced in situ.
As seen in the attached scans, LIDAR has captured
every detail of the vessel, from the individual com-
ponents of each frame station, to the position of the
knuckle chains below the boilers, to the strands of
oakum hanging below the freight deck planking
into the bilges. More importantly, the 3D model
can be rotated, sliced, and used to produce 2D
images for any number of purposes related to de-
scribing the general construction of the Evelyn,
or to highlight the details of its systems. A paper
describing the project is planned for the Society of
Historical Archaeology’s online technical series.

Phase Two: Initial Documentation of the Vessels

at West Dawson
In 2006 we learned the largest intact collec-
tion of sternwheelers in Canada, and perhaps the
western US, lay undocumented at West Dawson.
Our priorities for 2007 field work were to gather
as much field information as possible on these
seven large vessels, prepare the site inventory
forms that would incorporate them into the Cana-
dian national inventory, and size them up for fu-
ture work. We also hoped to gather measurements

Fig 5. Setting up a reference point for the scan station

www.inadiscover.com 51
on the several types of intact tiller-and-rudder systems.
The site was situated 550 kilometers north of White-
horse, and it took us two days to change crews for the sec-
ond phase and drive north. The site is opposite and slightly
downriver of Dawson City. From a large campsite it was a
350-meter hike north to the first cluster of four sternwheel-
ers. Here three vessels lay abreast of each other, with the
Julia B. being right next to the water, followed by the Seat-
tle No. 3 and the Schwatka, as one moves inshore. South of
these three vessels is a fourth, unidentified sternwheeler.
In the group of three vessels lying abreast, the Julia
B. is a 48.4-meter-long wooden-hulled vessel built in 1908
that has been heavily damaged by ice on the port side. En-
gine components, parts of the port smokestack, chainstays,
keelsons and stringers, and a ventilation funnel litter the
shore of the Yukon River and lie in shallow water. Her hull
is heavily built with multiple longitudinal streak/bulkhead
assemblies, four streak/truss engine supports, and large
transverse carriers under the boilers. The superstructure is
partially collapsed forward of the engine room which, while
upright, has a pronounced lean. The machinery, boiler and
engines are substantially intact. Decking and deck beams
are completely intact in the remaining portions of the hull,
and it is possible to access the entire hull thru various hatch-
es. Twin boilers are still on their mountings and transverse
Figs. 6 and 7. LIDAR cross-section of boiler area, Evelyn (in-
carriers, and the starboard one has breeching and stack
versed); remains of the paddle wheels of the Schwatka

52 The INA Annual 2007

 intact. The starboard engine is partially disassembled.
Cylinder, valves, wipers and levers, connecting rods,
and pitman arm are present. The port engine is less
complete. The sternwheel axle with five flanges, and it
is still attached to the starboard pillow block and pitman
arm. Most of the arms are missing from the flanges as are
the majority of the iron circles, and all of the buckets are
gone. The vessel has a complete tiller-and-rudder sys-
tem with three manual, overhead tillers affixed to stern-
posts via sets of gudgeons and long pins. Rudders are
present but lie deeply buried in sand. An unusual me-
chanical system—possibly a shock absorber—is attached
to a truss and lies disarticulated on top of the tiller arms.
The Seattle No. 3 and the Schwatka are 45.7 to
44.5-meter-long wooden-hulled vessels built in 1898.
They both display kingposts on large transverse carri-
ers, heavily reinforced bows, and the hulls are intact. Su-
perstructure has collapsed except for aft crews quarters
and steering compartment of the Seattle No. 3 . Engine
components are absent on the Seattle No. 3 , but present
on the Schwatka. Both ships have intact single boilers,
and the Schwatka has a complete (except for the buck-
ets) sternwheel assembly. The Seattle No. 3 contains a
unique but incomplete four-tiller and roller- steering
system with the tiller arms riding only slightly above
the main (freight) deck. Iron-sheathed wooden semi-
circles for tiller bearings are affixed to the freight deck,
but the tillers, rudders and rudder posts are absent. The
Schwatka contained a similar system consisting of four
rudders and rudder posts on pillow blocks. On this ves-
sel the tillers are located in the hold, below the main
(freight) deck where we found an almost completely in-
tact system of blocks, tiller arms, rollers, and linkages.
The last vessel in the first cluster remains unidenti-
fied. It has a measured length of 43.3 meters, a wooden
hull, rudder posts that turned on pillow blocks, three
streak/solid bulkhead assemblies, and four streak/
truss assemblies supporting the engines. No super-
structure remains, and only the aft five meters of the
main deck and deck beams are in place. All machinery,
engines, boiler, and stack are absent. A substantial
portion of the bottom planking and floors are miss-
ing amidships yet all frames and clamps remain. The
sternwheel, rudders and tillers, hog-posts and chains
are absent, although two cylinder timbers are visible.
Fig. 8. Superstructure collapse of the 110-year-old
Seattle No. 3.

www.inadiscover.com 53
 A second cluster of vessels is located an-
other 180 meters downriver and approximately
45 meters west of the shore. This cluster consists
of Mary F. Graff, the Victorian, and the Tyrell.
The Mary F. Graff is a wooden-hulled vessel built in
1898. It contains a substantial component of its engines
and ancillary machinery, plus a complex three-boiler bat-
tery. The tillers, rudders and sternwheel are missing. All
superstructure is missing and the hull has been burned
aft of boilers except for the chine, outer frames, clamps
and upper hull planking. No deck beams or planking re-
main except at the bow where they have collapsed into the
hold. A central hogpost was noted forward of the boiler,
yet there was no evidence of a corresponding transverse
carrier. Both engines, along with some ancillary machin-
ery and decorative control arms, lie in an area of the hull
that was almost completely consumed by fire. The “pud-
ding” or decorative stack top of this vessel, lies nearby.
A steam-powered Hyde capstan built in Bath, Maine,
lies on the collapsed freight deck near the bow. One
keelson and two streaks were noted and appear under-
sized. Each support truss-built, longitudinal bulkheads.
The Victorian is another wooden-hulled 1898 ves-
sel. The hull is open to the sky except for the forward Figs. 9 and 10. Above, journalist Koppel points to tiller-roller bearing
12 meters of bow, and evidence of fire can be seen on surfaces on the Seattle No. 3, possibly from connecting linkages; below,
the outside of the hull, aft on the port side. Super- Koepnick with transverse carrier and toppled kingpost, Seattle No. 3
structure and machinery are removed. Decking and
deck beams are removed/destroyed except for the for-
ward 12 meters of the bow. The sternwheel is absent
and no large machinery such as engines, pitman arms,
boilers, or auxiliary team pumps are present. Identi-
fication is certain given the presence of a faint name
stencilled on the bow. The port cylinder beam and
port rudder show signs of repair, possibly as a result
of damage incurred during a grounding while being
towed from the Stikine to Alaska. The most substantive
features of the vessel are a complete tiller and rudder
system at the stern, where three manual, overhead til-
lers are fixed with pairs of gudgeons and long pins, and
rest in wells between the transom and false transom.
The Tyrell is a 43.4-meter composite steel-wood-
en hulled vessel built in 1898. This is the sole example
of a composite-hulled vessel at West Dawson. The
ship displays steel sides and chines, steel bulkheads,
and steel deck beams. These steel components are
completely intact. The bottom is planked with wood.
Thirteen separate compartments were noted, many of
which were isolated from the remainder of the hold.

54 The INA Annual 2007

Fig. 11. Woodward with triple tillers, Victorian
The remaining machinery includes a condenser in the
hold, and a single steam cylinder and monkey rudder
post lying on the freight deck. No hog posts or chains
were noted and the vessel’s wooden superstructure is
completely missing above the main (freight) deck. Til-
lers, rudders, and paddle wheel are missing. The rudder
posts turned on pillow blocks. One of two cylinder tim-
bers remains and of the engine machinery, a single one
engine cylinder (40.6 centimeter diameter by 216 cen-
timeters) lies disassembled on the main (freight) deck.
This brief overview cannot begin to do justice to
the complexity and richness of the West Dawson site.
This site is an unstudied, outdoor museum of late nine-
teenth century construction, and while remote, it is a
relatively safe and efficient site to conduct compara-
tive studies on hull construction and ships’ mechani-
www.inadiscover.com
cal systems. Most hull and many engine, boiler, and
steering components are substantially intact. We ex-
pect to work on this site for a number of years to come.
The 2007 field season can be summarized as follows:
• A state-of-the-art LIDAR survey was conducted
on the Evelyn. James Delgado believes the Ship-
yard Island work is one of the largest, in-situ LI-
DAR project yet conducted in nautical archaeology.
• Seven vessels at the West Dawson site were document-
ed, and added to the territorial and national inventories.
We can now say conclusively that the Yukon sternwheel-
ers were anything but uniform in construction method
and design. The differences among vessels support the
theory some archaic and novel designs were used in the
rush to build 110 sternwheelers on the West Coast in 1898.
55
• Valuable data and insights were obtained concern-
ing the types of tiller-and-rudder systems used on
the northern sternwheelers. This component study
proved most worthwhile in terms of its insights.
The amount of information generated in the
2005 and 2007 field seasons is such that several pub-
lications and presentations are now feasible. The first
publication—an overview of the 20 +/- sternwheeler
sites—is underway for submission to the Yukon Ter-
ritorial Government, and we hope to have this docu-
ment plus an SHA on-line technical publication on the
LIDAR project, in print by early 2009. Field work for
June 2008 will consist of further reconnaissance work
on the Thirty Mile Section of the River, and—if water
conditions permit—a detailed mapping project on the
wreck of the Klondike. No plans have yet been made
for 2009 field work, however, the West Dawson site
offers many possibilities for component studies, and it
is the logical place to continue the effort at low cost.◆

Acknowledgements
The 2007 field crew included Doug Davidge
(Whitehorse, British Columbia), Doug Devine (Or-
egon), Sam Koepnick (INA, Texas A&M), Tom Koppell
(Archaeology Magazine), John Pollack (INA, British Co-
lumbia), Carlos Velazquez (Oregon), and Robyn Wood-
ward (INA, Vancouver). Our sincere thanks to all of you.
The 2007 fieldwork would not have been possible
without the financial support of the Institute of Nauti-
cal Archaeology, Kevin Crisman, and a small number of
private donors who contributed through the auspices of
the Vancouver Maritime Museum. These donors include
James Delgado, Phil Lind, A.J.P. Oswald, David Podmore,
Mr. and Mrs. Blake Pottinger, and Robyn Woodward,
Carlos Velazquez and Doug Devine of EP-
ICSCAN and Pacific Survey Supplies, enthusiasti-
cally contributed their time, state-of-the-art LIDAR
equipment and world-class expertise to the project.
Tom Koppel, contract writer for Archae-
ology magazine, worked with us at West Daw-
son and in his thorough article has accurately
captured the urgency of the work in the North.
Finally, James Delgado, CEO and president of INA,
has fostered this project from the beginning. Likewise
Jeff Hunston (Manager, Heritage Resources Unit, Yukon
Territorial Government) has consistently provided in-
sight, advice and support during the permitting process.
Fig. 12. 3-boiler battery, Mary F. Graff
References
Affleck, E. L., 2000. A century of paddle-
wheelers in the Pacific Northwest, the Yu-
kon and Alaska. Alexander Nicolls Press #208
2250 S.E. Marine Drive, Vancouver, B.C.
Easton, N.A. 1986. Yukon Underwater Diving Association
Heritage Resources Inventory—Final Report. File report
for the Heritage Branch, Yukon Government Whitehorse.
Pollack, J.C. and R. P. Woodward. 2006. A Recon-
naissance Survey of the Yukon River between Lake
Laberge and Carmacks. File report for the Heri-
tage Branch, Yukon Government Whitehorse.
Pollack, J.C.., R.P. Woodward, S. Koepnick, C.
Velazquez, D. Devine and D. Davidge. 2008. The
Yukon River Survey, 2007. File report for the Heri-
tage Branch, Yukon Government Whitehorse.
Waddell, Peter J.A. 1979. The 1978 Yukon Ma-
rine Archaeology Survey. Archaeological Re-
search Division, File report for the Nation-
al Historic Parks and Sites Branch, Ottawa.

56 The INA Annual 2007

 PHOENICIANS IN THE WEST
The Ancient Shipwreck Site of Bajo de la Campana, Spain
Mark E. Polzer and Juan Pinedo reyes

The Phoenicians—their name conjures up images of generally refer to the coastal inhabitants of Syria-Palestine
shrewd merchants who traversed the far reaches of the during the Bronze Age as Canaanites, and reserve the term
ancient known world in ships searching for raw materials Phoenician for the same peoples of the Iron Age, or the
sources and markets for their goods. Yet we know rela- first millennium B.C. From around the end of the ninth
tively little about these enigmatic people from the Levant, century B.C., constrained by geopolitical circumstances
what today is roughly Lebanon? A large part of the problem in their homeland, the Phoenicians—especially from the
is the limited source material we have to work with. The city of Tyre—set upon a period of great exploration and
Phoenicians themselves left few written records to docu- colonization directed westward, much of it driven by com-
ment their lives, mercial interests.
political organiza- Perhaps the most
tions, culture, and famous and semi-
the great sea voy- nal event of this
ages of trade and migration was the
colonization for founding of Car-
which they are so thage on the north
renowned. Most African coast, in
of our knowledge what is today Tuni-
of these things sia. Carthage would
comes from Greek grow in power and
and Roman histo- wealth and assume
rians writing many commercial and
centuries later. maritime domi-
Unfortunately, the nance in the west-
Greeks and Ro- ern Mediterranean.
mans were often This position would
bitter adversaries eventually bring it
of the Phoenicians Fig. 1. Elephant tusks recovered during the survey (photo by Mark Polzer) into direct conflict
and so much of their with another bur-
works are tainted geoning power,
with legend and bias. The Assyrian annals and Hebrew Rome, and lead ultimately to the city’s demise.
Scriptures provide the only contemporary written sources Phoenician colonization of the Iberian peninsula and
for the Phoenicians, but these only record events in Bib- exploitation of its metal deposits (especially those of silver,
lical lands and the eastern Mediterranean. Testimony of tin, and lead) and agricultural resources can be traced by
Phoenician activities in the west are nearly non-existent. archaeological evidence to this same period, between the
In recent decades, Phoenician archaeology has made late ninth and seventh centuries B.C. After the Phoenician
great strides in unlocking the secrets of Phoenician activ- homeland fell under Babylonian domination in the mid-sixth
ity throughout the Mediterranean and beyond, though it century B.C., Carthage assumed military and political he-
still remains far behind Greek and Roman studies. INA has gemony over the Phoenician colonies and mercantile inter-
played a significant role in this regard. Founder George ests in the west. Historians mark this transition by referring
Bass’ ground-breaking underwater excavation of the to the western Phoenicians after this time as Punic, which
twelfth-century B.C. wreck at Cape Gelidonya and INA’s comes from the Latin punicas, a transcription of the Greek
landmark discovery and study of the Late Bronze Age ship- name phoinix from which we derive our name Phoenicia.
wreck at Uluburun have rewritten the early history of these INA’s research in this field continues now with the
people and trade in the eastern Mediterranean. Historians investigation of a probable Phoenician shipwreck at a

www.inadiscover.com 57
submerged site in southeastern Spain known as Bajo de quent investigations of the site, including INA’s survey in
la Campana (“Shallows of the Bell”). The site is located the summer of 2007, have revealed evidence for at least
in the Mar Menor region of Murcia, northeast of Cartage- three ancient wrecks. The oldest material recovered so far
na. It first came to light in the late 1950s and 1960s when includes western Phoenician amphoras, bowls, and plates
salvage divers, dynamiting modern shipwrecks for scrap that date to the late seventh or early sixth centuries B.C.,
metal, began finding antiquities on the seabed. Subse- during the period of growing Carthaginian influence in
the region. The ship was also
transporting an assortment
of raw materials including
tin ingots possibly from Gali-
cia, on the northern Atlantic
coast of Iberia; silver-bear-
ing lead ore known as galena,
likely mined locally around
Cartagena; lumps of raw am-
ber; pine cones; and ivory
from north Africa. INA’s
investigation found four el-
ephant tusks, including one
remarkable example measur-
ing over a meter in length and
bearing a Phoenician inscrip-
tion at its root end. Recov-
ered from beneath the tusk
was a double-ended wooden
comb decorated with incised
horizontal and vertical lines.
From the other two
wrecks the team found Pu-
nic amphoras from Ibiza
and black-glazed ceramic
wares from Italy that date
to the second century B.C.,
around the time that Rome
completed the final destruc-
tion of its centuries-old
nemesis Carthage; and Ro-
man amphoras used to carry
fish sauce, wine, and olive oil
that date to the first century
A.D., when Cartagena and
the surrounding region en-
joyed great prosperity as part
of the Roman empire. The
survey also recovered several
Fig. 2. Map of southeastern Spain showing the location of Bajo de la Campana (map by Mark Pol- copper nails, lead sheathing,
zer) and ballast stones from one
or more of the ships’ hulls.

58 The INA Annual 2007

Figs. 3. and 4. Plan of the Phoenician/Punic shipwrecks site, with
the wall of the Bajo, the “cave,” and the crevasse forming the up-
per (western) extent of the site; a piece of Campana A ware from
southern Italy (2nd century B.C.), was part of the cargo from the
Punic shipwreck. (Plan and photo by Mark Polzer)

INA will begin a thorough excavation and study

of the Phoenician wreck in 2008. Not only will this be
the first such undertaking for INA in the western Medi-
terranean, but it will be the first wreck of a seagoing
Phoenician ship to be excavated and studied. As such,
the project is posed to provide exciting new archaeo-
logical evidence for Phoenician activity in Iberia and
trade in the western Mediterranean. The cargo materi-
als known already to have been on board—tin from the
Atlantic, elephant ivory from Africa, amber from the
Baltic, and lead from southeastern Iberia—have the po-
tential to illuminate far-flung trade and production pat-

www.inadiscover.com 59
terns in the Archaic Mediterranean world, much as the students of the Nautical Archaeology Program at Texas
Uluburun shipwreck material did for the Bronze Age. A&M University, while also training Spain’s next genera-
INA’s venture in Spain marks a new chapter in its tion of maritime archaeologists through field school op-
illustrious history. Most of INA’s work in the Mediterra- portunities. With such promise for the future, it is a true
nean has been focused on the east, particularly in Turkish honor and privilege to have been invited by the Ministry to
waters. In 1970, an INA team directed by David Owen ex- work with their institutions to help move maritime archae-
cavated the looted wreck- ology forward in Spain.◆
age of a late fifth-century
B.C. ship at Porticello, Acknowledgements
off the coast of south- It is with deep grati-
ern Italy in the Straits of tude that we recognize
Messina (The INA Quar- the enthusiastic support
terly 2:1-4). Now, with of the Region of Murcia,
the commencement of who granted us the ar-
the Bajo de la Campana chaeological and marine
shipwrecks excavation, operating permits to
INA is extending the conduct the investiga-
geographical boundary tion, and of the Ministry
of its work to the west- of Culture of Spain. Fi-
ernmost reaches of the nancial support for the
Mediterranean. None initial season of investi-
of this would have been gation was provided by a
possible without the in- generous grant from the
terest and enthusiastic Spain-USA Foundation,
support of Spain’s Minis- thanks in large part to
try of Culture and, more INA General Counsel Jim
specifically, Director Goold and Jorge Sobredo
Rafael Azuar and his staff Galanes, Minister of Cul-
at the National Museum tural Affairs at the Span-
of Maritime Archaeology ish Embassy. Additional
(MNAM) in Cartagena. Fig. 5 Co-director Juan Pinedo searches a grid sector in the Phoenician funding was provided by
The excavation of the site area after two tusks were removed from it (photo by Mark Polzer). INA director John De
is a cooperative effort Lapa and the Waitt Fam-
between INA, MNAN, and its associated National Center ily Foundation. The Institute of Nautical Archaeology
for Underwater Archaeological Research (CNIAS). The and Texas A&M University supported our initial develop-
MNAM-CNIAS has a long history of archaeological inves- ment efforts in 2006, which enabled the project and col-
tigation and cultural management of the underwater pat- laboration to materialize. The stalwart core of our team
rimony of southeastern Spain, but has not undertaken an this summer consisted of MNAM-CNIAS boat captain
underwater excavation since 1995. The new partnership and diving safety officer Emilio Peñuelas González and
with INA is one of mutual benefit. The Museum is pro- Nautical Archaeology Program students Carlos Cabrera
viding storage and conservation of the artifactual material and Piotr Bojakowski, each of whom participated for the
from the excavation as well as contributing financial and entire six weeks of the project. Additional team mem-
logistical support to the project. INA, in turn, will provide bers included Nautical Archaeology Program doctoral
fieldwork and research expertise to train the Museum’s candidate Wendy van Duivenvoorde from the Western
archaeological staff. The project will also generate posi- Australia Maritime Museum; Eduardo Roa Brynildsen,
tive publicity and collection material for the new museum an intern at the Vasa Museum in Stockholm; Christin
that the Ministry is building in Cartagena. The collabora- Heamägi, also from the Vasa Museum and an incoming
tion will open new possibilities for research to INA and graduate student of the Maritime Archaeology Program

60 The INA Annual 2007

at the University of Southampton; archaeology gradu-
ate Miguel Lirio Diaz; archaeologist Josué Mata Mora;
and professional diver Joaquin Carrasco Burguete. The
administration and staff at the MNAM-CNIAS proved to
be excellent partners in this endeavor. Director Rafael
Azuar Ruiz, curator María Ángeles Pérez Bonet, and head
archaeologist Rocío Castillo Belinchon all supported the
project with personnel, equipment, and resources; staff
archaeologists José Rodriguez Iborra, Ana Miñano, and
David Munuera Navarro rotated time with us in the field;
head conservator Milagros Buendía Ortuño and her staff
are overseeing the conservation and storage of the raised
artifacts; and Juan González provided photographic ser-
vices. Luis Manzano Diaz, director of the Puerto Tomás
Maestre marina in La Manga, kindly provided a slip for us
to dock our boat and allowed us to set a storage container
on site in which to keep our dive gear and other supplies.
And finally, Annunziata Ponce Albendea volunteered so
much of her time to the project as logistical coordina-
tor, interpreter, and general liaison in Spain; our work
would have been so much more difficult without her.
Suggested reading
Aubet, M. E. 2001. The Phoenicians and the West: Poli-
tics, Colonies, and Trade. Cambridge University Press.
Mas García, J. 1985. El Polígono Submarino de Cabo de
Palos. In Arqueología Submarina: VI Congreso Internacio-
nal de Arqueología Submarina, Cartagena 1982. Ministe-
rio de Cultura, Dirección General de Bellas Artes y Archi-
vos, Subdirección General de Arqueología y Etnografía.
Roldán Bernal, B., M. Martín Camino, and A. Pérez Bonet.
1995. El yacimiento submarino del Bajo de la Campana
(Cartagena, Murcia): catálogo y estudio de los materiales ar-
queológicos. Cuadernos de arqueología marítima 3:11-61.

The 2007 Bajo de la Campana team, from left: Mark Polzer, Miguel Lirio Diaz, Ana Miñano Domínguez, Emilio Peñuelas González, José
Antonio Moya, Carlos Cabrera, Juan Pinedo Reyes, Joaquin Carrasco Burguete, and David Munuera Navarro; not pictured: Piotr Bo-
jakowski, Wendy van Duivenvoorde, Christin Heamägi, Eduardo Roa Brynildsen, José Rodriguez Iborra, and Josué Mata Mora (photo
by Piotr Bojakowski)

www.inadiscover.com 61